Dr. Kangarloo Receives NIH/NIBIB Grant to Study Osteoporosis
05/01/2009
UCLA Radiological Sciences is pleased to announce that Dr. Hooshang Kangarloo, Director of the Medical Imaging Informatics Group (MII), has been awarded a NIH/NIBIB Research Project Grant (R01) to develop an imaging-based disease model for bone development to better comprehend the genesis of osteoporosis, a debilitating disease in which bones become fragile and more likely to break due to a loss of bone mineral density (BMD).
Osteoporosis: A Silent Disease
Osteoporosis affects both men and women of all ages. It is often called a silent disease because bone loss occurs without symptoms. People may not know that they have osteoporosis until their bones become so weak that a sudden strain, bump, or fall causes a hip to fracture or a vertebra to collapse. Collapsed vertebrae may initially be felt or seen in the form of severe back pain, loss of height, or spinal deformities such as kyphosis (severely stooped posture). Statistics show that approximately 10 million Americans have been diagnosed with this problem, and another 34 million are at high risk with low bone mass.
However, there is an increasing awareness that bone mineral density should not be considered the sole indicator; but that other values including bone shape (morphology) and quality play important roles in determining fracture risk. A panoply of variables - genetic, demographic, environmental, lifestyle - all contribute to a complex set of interactions.
In the awarded proposal, Dr. Kangarloo proposed to develop an imaging- based disease model for bone development to better understand the factors contributing to osteoporosis.
This model hopes to aid in physician decisions in osteoporosis diagnosis and early interventions.
Modeling The Factors That Influence Bone Quality
Understanding the interplay of bone density, bone quality, and other variables can elucidate the development of osteoporosis and subsequent fragility fractures, potentially leading to prognostic indicators that minimize or completely avert bone loss earlier in the process. However, no model has arisen to unify this knowledge into a useful clinical tool that can inform decisions.
Dr. Kangarloo proposed to obtain a more complete picture of the variables that drive bone density and trabecular structure by examining bone quality within a normal young adult population, gathering information on demographics, health status, and imaging including Dual-energy X-ray Absorptiometry (DXA), computed tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance (MR). In particular, working with Dr. John Adams of the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, an expert endocrinologist in bone and mineral metabolism, the role of "the sunshine vitamin" on bone health will be assessed.
The information will be collected and used to create a probabilistic Bayesian belief network (BBN) disease model that can help predict the likelihood of fractures and to assist researchers in identifying variables that should be addressed to optimize bone health. A secondary testbed of known young adults at risk for osteoporosis and bone fractures (including renal osteodystrophy and disuse osteoporosis) will be examined to test the predictive power of this model. This research will ultimately aid in clinical decision-making processes affecting bone development and early interventions to limit, if not remove, the risks associated with osteoporosis.
