Focus on osteoporosis

  Osteoporosis is a common, prevalent and epidemic disease among middle-aged and elderly people. Osteoporosis has long been discharged by the international medical community as one of the top five diseases alongside hypertension, atherosclerosis, diabetes and tumors. China is the most populous country in the world, and also the country with the largest elderly population, currently there are 130 million people over 60 years old (about 10%), and about 75% of people over 60 years old suffer from osteoporosis, so there are about 100 million osteoporosis patients, accounting for 7.7% of the total population. And with the improvement of living standards and the extension of life expectancy of the population, the elderly population is growing at an average rate of 3.2%, and it is expected that the number of osteoporosis patients will surge to more than 200 million by 2050, accounting for 13.2% of the population. While the resident population of Lanzhou City is 3.62 million, there are 450,000 elderly people over 60 years old, and the population structure is gradually entering aging.  Among the above-mentioned types of fractures, osteoporosis in the elderly has the highest proportion of hip fracture hospitalization, the longest hospitalization time, the largest medical cost, and the worst prognosis. According to foreign data, 20% of patients die within one year, 25% of those who survive for more than one year lose their mobility and 21% need crutches to walk. Every year, hip fractures caused by this alone cause great losses and economic burdens to the country, the collective and the individual, and the morbidity and mortality rates are alarming.  It is important to actively prevent osteoporosis and to treat it once it is detected.