The Impact of Glomerular Disorders on Bone Quality and Strength

Children and adults with glomerular disease have unique and potentially modifiable risk factors for compromised bone health, but our current understanding of skeletal fragility in glomerular disease is lacking. In the first large population-based cohort study, we recently found that primary glomerular disease was independently associated with an increased risk of incident fracture, and that hip fracture risk was >2-fold greater in patients younger vs. older than 40 years of age. Mechanisms that drive increased fracture risk in glomerular disease are not clear but likely multifactorial. Our prior work demonstrated that glomerular disease is associated with disturbances in vitamin D and mineral metabolism, in addition to and exacerbated by reduced kidney function.

Patients with glomerular disease are also exposed to medications which may negatively impact bone health, most notably high-dose and long-term glucocorticoid therapy. Identifying modifiable factors that compromise bone strength will facilitate the development of strategies to reduce fractures and other skeletal complications across the life course. The proposed multi-center study will leverage the infrastructure of the NIH-funded Cure Glomerulopathy (CureGN) prospective cohort study and the resources of two health systems with expertise in state-of-the-art high-resolution bone imaging methods, to conduct the first prospective, longitudinal study to assess determinants of impaired bone quality and strength in glomerular disease.