Medicine reduces damage in children's bone disease

Aug 17, 2000

TALLINN (BNS) - Doctors in the Estonian town of Tartu are possibly the first in the world to discover the possibility of alleviating the symptoms of a grave hereditary children's disease. Doctors at Tartu's Maarjamoisa Hospital attempted fighting the disease osteogenesis imperfecta, the disease of brittle bones in children, with two medicines normally prescribed for osteoporosis patients, although even the manufacturer had no information of its effectiveness, the daily Eesti Paevaleht reported.

Doctor Katre Maasalu from the Maarjamoisa Hospital's orthopedics department said the medicines inhibit the activity of cells disintegrating bone and foster that of bone growing cells, so bones become stronger.

"As a result, the number of bone fractures have drastically declined," Maasalu said. "Some children have had no fractures at all after they started to get the treatment, and some have only had a few."

Maasalu quoted the example of a 5-year-old boy who had 25 bone fractures but now leads the life of a nearly healthy person. Even wheelchair-bound children can stand up after about half a year of treatment and will soon be able to walk without assistance, doctors hope.

About 30 children in Estonia have the brittle bones disease, and 15 of them are under receiving the treatment under Tartu doctors' care.

Aare Martson, head of the Maarjamoisa Hospital's traumatology and orthopedics clinic, said the results of the treatment are promising, but the effect of the medicines still requires investigation.

"The disease is genetic and it is impossible to cure it with medicines," Martson said. "But we can significantly alleviate the course of the disease, and the bones no longer break so easily."

Gennady Nikolayev, a representative of the manufacturer, said Tartu doctors are certainly among the first in the world to use the medicine against osteogenesis imperfecta, and investigations now underway in a number of countries should officially confirm the Tartu doctors' results.

Ulle Kruus, head of the children's department at the neurological rehabilitation center in Haapsalu, was skeptical of the Tartu doctors' discovery.

"I'd like to see some patients myself before I really believe it," she said.

Maasalu said they had observed no side effects in any of the children and bone density could be measured to confirm the results.

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