Subject-specific prediction of femoral strength to improve fracture risk assessment in elderly individuals

Over 40% of Swedish women and 13% of men over 50 years will have an osteoporotic fracture at the hip, spine, or wrist. An essential step to prevent these fractures is to identify the subjects who are at high risk. The current clinical assessment for fracture risk, based on bone mineral density (BMD) combined with risk factors, fails to identify about 30% of those who actually fracture.
The aim of this project is to develop a more accurate method to assess fracture risk based on the actual bone strength, calculated using patient-specific finite element (FE) models. This new method will be evaluated against data from two large clinical cohorts.
The project combines several advanced computational techniques in a fashion which is compatible with the current clinical scenario. The validation using data from prospective clinical cohorts will represent a milestone to bridge the gap between engineering and medicine.
The timely and accurate prediction of fracture risk that can be achieved by introducing individual bone strength can reduce the number of people incurring in osteoporotic fractures, thus ultimately contributing to a significant improvement of the health status in the population.