Aims and Learning Outcomes
An award-bearing independent module for medical professionals who want a short course in this subject and who may not wish to embark upon the full MSc.
This module offers a theoretical understanding of the aetiology, diagnosis and modern management of osteoporosis, an increasingly important condition both in general medicine and in reproductive health care.
Learn to
- Appreciate the epidemiology and pathophysiology of osteoporosis
- Understand the clinical risk factors for osteoporosis and have an appreciation of the available strategies for identifying high-risk individuals
- Understand the differences between the technologies for bone density and bone turnover measurement and appreciate their place in clinical practice
- Distinguish between primary and secondary osteoporosis
- Understand the strengths and weaknesses of the available treatments to prevent or slow the development of osteoporosis
- Appreciate how the disabilities of osteoporosis may be minimised
- Appreciate the possible factors underlying falls in the elderly, and strategies to reduce risk
- Appreciate the importance of critical appraisal and evidence-based medicine and to apply these principles in the clinical setting of osteoporosis
Course structure
- Epidemiology of osteoporosis
- Eating disorders and osteoporosis
- Health economics of osteoporosis
- Bone density and bone turnover assessment
- Normal bone metabolism
- The role of clinical risk factors in osteoporosis
- Pathophysiology of osteoporosis
- Treatments to preserve bone
- Primary and secondary osteoporosis
- Falls in the elderly and their prevention
- The role of the menopause
- Minimising the disability in osteoporosis
- Corticosteroid-induced osteoporosis
- Clinical guidelines in osteoporosis