What's your experience with Fosamax?

jnette, ASN, EMT-I · Oct 17, 2004

I had an NP insist that I take the stuff. She said if I had concerns I could take protonix the night before so I would not have any acidy heart burn or reflux.
Okay. We're supposed to take it on an empty stomach, I'm gonna stretch here and suggest it is because BEING ALL ABOUT MINERALS it needs the acid and cannot share it with something like food. So we're gonna do something to decrease the amount of acid available to it? I asked her about it and she said (are you ready for this one?) "the pharmaceutical rep said it would be OK to do that."
And the pharmaceutical rep knows and understands any of the research? Or maybe wants to sell more fosamax..... He sure wouldn't be anybody whose authority I would trust, even for whether a tissue was clean....
I immediately dropped the drug as probably too dangerous for my minimal need (I am supposedly just over the line but those things are open to question as the radiologist is also using his "best judgment").
I dropped the NP because I believed (for this and other reasons) that I had ceased to be a patient and had become a "mark." I'm not interested in supporting the medical and pharmaceutical industries.
Interestingly, and maybe I should've put this at the top, I just read a presentation of research done on fosamax. Cellular pics at 160x and all. The conclusion? That more bone ain't stronger bone. There were few if any osteoblasts. Some of the clasts that should've been there weren't there either.
More reason not to take it.
BUT. My 87 year old father-in-law has osteoporosis. He is thin and rather frail, although active, with very few health problems, and with very many good healthy habits. He is taking fosamax. In this case, I support it wholeheartedly. It is unlikely that he will be taking it for 30 years. And very likely that more bone is better than less bone.
I think if we are young (50's) and have no family history and have only "borderline" (if you trust those charlatans at all) bone density results (I was between 0 and -.01), we absolutely do not know what taking the stuff now will mean when we are in our 80's.
And the drug companies sure as heck don't care.
Just my two dollars worth (inflation, ya know! :rotfl: )

Couldn't agree with you more, Chris !

After researching and reading Vicky's links I decided the same.. in fact, I believe it says in the long run, it actually DECREASES what available bone mass one has. No thanx. For those in the latter years, might be a good thing, but I plan to be around awhile yet and don't want to diminish what bone I still have over the next 30-40 years.

My mom just suffered a fx. rib the other day.. dropped her spoon at the kitchen table and bent over to pick it up.. *SNAP* !

She has bone density tests done annually.. religiously.. has never shown even a HINT of osteoperosis... so what's up with THAT??? :confused:

chris_at_lucas_RN, RN · Oct 17, 2004

My mom just suffered a fx. rib the other day.. dropped her spoon at the kitchen table and bent over to pick it up.. *SNAP* !
She has bone density tests done annually.. religiously.. has never shown even a HINT of osteoperosis... so what's up with THAT???

I would be concerned about some sort of pathological process. I'm assuming that some kind of scans were done? The almost bizarre circumstances of the fracture demand that she have more than a standard x-ray and tape around her torso.

Take care of her.... And keep us posted!