In this episode we discuss the origin of our podcast and describe our goal with the podcast as presenting information about Osteoporosis as well as tracking our journey living with the disease. In future episodes we will cover all of the steps we have gone through as well as cover the four major topics around treatment which include weight-bearing exercises to improve Osteoporosis, taking bone health supplements to improve Osteoporosis, proper nutrition and diet to improve Osteoporosis and taking prescription drugs to improve Osteoporosis.
We'll cover these topics as well as many of the products on the market that claim to help improve Osteoporosis, Osteopenia, low bone mineral density and low bone strength. We'll present all the research surrounding both the topics and products in easy to understand language (as few medical or scientific terms as possible) so that you can make your own decisions about what is best for your health. Please visit OSTEGO.COM/PODCAST to leave any questions you would like answered on the show. Thanks and welcome to our Ostego family. I look forward to serving you in any way I can.
In this episode we discuss the origin of our podcast and describe our goal with the podcast as presenting information about Osteoporosis as well as tracking our journey living with the disease. In future episodes we will cover all of the steps we have gone through as well as cover the four major topics around treatment which include weight-bearing exercises to improve Osteoporosis, taking bone health supplements to improve Osteoporosis, proper nutrition and diet to improve Osteoporosis and taking prescription drugs to improve Osteoporosis.
We'll cover these topics as well as many of the products on the market that claim to help improve Osteoporosis, Osteopenia, low bone mineral density and low bone strength. We'll present all the research surrounding both the topics and products in easy to understand language (as few medical or scientific terms as possible) so that you can make your own decisions about what is best for your health. Please visit OSTEGO.COM/PODCAST to leave any questions you would like answered on the show. Thanks and welcome to our Ostego family. I look forward to serving you in any way I can.
Hey there and thank you so much for joining us for this first ever edition of The Truth About Osteoporosis Podcast and YouTube channel. We'll be publishing every episode in both podcast format-- so you can get it wherever you get your favorite podcasts-- and we'll also have a video version available on YouTube for everyone who prefers YouTube or video in general. So this is just as the first edition, we really just wanted to discuss and introduce myself, our mission and what the goal of this particular podcast is. So just jumping right in our entire journey with Osteoporosis started a little over a year ago. When my wife Mary, her mother, my mother-in-law was diagnosed with advanced Osteoporosis. And the reason she was diagnosed is because she had two fractures, two vertebrae were crushed in what they call a wedge fracture. And again, we'll be discussing that more in a future edition. But she had two wedge fractures. She was in instant pain. She went from a very active lifestyle, helping people, always on the move. She had no idea she had Osteoporosis and then one wrong move. She was twisting and picking something up and she just didn't know she shouldn't be doing that. And like I said, she had two broken vertebrae immediately. And now she still lives in pain. So we immediately started jumping into learning about Osteoporosis, just to be part of helping her. And as a part of that, a few weeks later Mary decided that, just to learn about this process-- and also on the second reason was because there are some hereditary markers that could lead to showing if you have Osteoporosis or not-- she decided to get a DEXA scan just to see. Now a DEXA scan is a very low radiation x-ray, that's used to measure the density of your bones, and that density is important because it tells us how much calcium is in your bones and that can tell us a couple of things. But it's a big indicator of how strong your bones are. And it is that reading, the score that comes from that scan, it's called a T s c ore. And again, we'll be getting into DEXA scans and T- s cores a lot more in the future, but, but Mary had one and she found out at age 50 that she had Osteoporosis. Again, no idea, no indicators, no fractures, no anything. But then, u h, w e had extra reason to worry and, and of course we were concerned for our mother-in-law, but you know, this is my wife. This is, this is the person I'm spending my life with. And all of a sudden we had big questions. Is this curable? Is it reversible? How dangerous is it? Like, what is her chance,of fracturing a bone? What activities can she participate in or not? I mean, honestly, it was incredibly scary. So we jumped in. We did not have any problem jumping in to try to go down the research path, to learn as much as we possibly could about Osteoporosis. And we learned a lot. And along the way, we really learned that while there is a lot of information available, m ost of the information that's available is very technical it's written for doctors and scientists and people in the medical profession. So it's in some sense, hard to read, hard to understand what those studies are saying. So we decided not long after that to make it our mission, to take the information that we had learned and put it into a simple, easy to understand format so that people, when they have a new diagnosis, a recent diagnosis, they have a place to come, or they can get very, they have a quick resource to information. Everything we do is going to be backed up by the studies we've read the same studies that doctors use when prescribing medicine and things like that. And speaking of medicine, I mean, one of the things that we learned along the way was there are a lot of things to consider before you say yes to taking medicine. Now, some people have to, some people don't, and there are reasons why you would choose to take medicine and not to take medicine in some situations, but there are three things we found out that you can do that everyone should do right away. Number one is you should start exercising, weight bearing exercise, I'm sure you've already heard is very helpful for Osteoporosis. But we learned there's a little bit more, or there's a lot more that goes into it other than just performing w eight b earing exercises. So we'll be covering that in a future episode. We learned you really almost must, unless you are, you know, the top couple percent of people who take in a lot of natural calcium, you really should be taking a calcium supplement. And it's not just calcium, there's vitamin D and there's other things that need to be involved with it. So there's a lot to decide what calcium supplement you should take. And then third, there are some simple, easy changes that you can make to your diet. So the foods that you eat on a daily basis, things that you can a d d to your meals, some things that you should take away from your meals. And the reason it's so important is because while the supplements helps put ne w minerals into your body, your body is not that efficient at soaking in those minerals. So it's not instantaneous, it doesn't happen overnight. So if you change your diet you can help keep your body from pulling calcium out of your bones. Now, the reason it does that, it's because there are a lot of processes that take place in your body where calcium is actually one of the chemicals that's needed to have the chemical reaction happen properly. So if your body doesn't have enough in its bloodstream, it will actually pull it out of your bones. So again, exercise, nutrition and supplementation are key to start immediately, e ven while you're making that pharmaceutical, d ecision with your doctor. And so what we want to do again, we want to walk you through all the information that we found step by step by step. We're not here to try to guide anyone in any way. We want you to discuss everything with your healthcare providers and make an informed decision that is best for you, but I'll just give you an example. Mary got one T-score and it said-- a T s core being a result from a DEXA scan-- and the doctor instantly said, you should take a medicine. Here's a prescription. And obviously we were concerned about that because, because some of these drugs have some pretty nasty side effects. And s o we got a second opinion with an Osteoporosis specialist and he said, no, you don't need to take a pharmaceutical just yet. You might, but not right now, and walked us through why that was the case. So trust your h ealthcare providers. W e a re not here, there's no intention for us to try to take that place, but there is some information that's very important that even some doctors might not be aware of if they aren't Osteoporosis specialists. So again, that's why we're here. We're here to give you the information so that you can take it, have it, and discuss it with whoever you think is appropriate. So that's it. We're here to give information. We're here to track our journey through Osteoporosis. And second, the reason for the title, The Truth About Osteoporosis is as we've been learning, we have found mo r e than one co m pany whose goal is really simply to sell a product. And they use what I would say are at the very least misleading qu o tes and studies to help convince you to purchase their pro ducts. S o in all those cases we' re going to be going through them. And we're going to be talking about some products which are great, and some which are a little questionable. And we're going to give you all the information and you can make the decisions on your own as to whether they are right for you or not. So, but that's it. So teaching people what we learned, and then talking about, some products that are out there on the market. O stego.com/podcast, is where you'll find the information about all of our podcasts. You can search them by subject. So if you want to go back and search for a particular subject, and also on that page, if you have a question, if you have something that you would like us to cover, then please let us know. There's a form where you can say,"Hey, this is something I'd like you to cover-- please cover this in one of your future episodes." And if we can, if we can find the information, we'd love to do that for you. Again, our purpose is here to be here to serve. We are, this is a family diagnosis for us. So we are in it. Our, our friends that we've been telling already what we've learned, they've really been part of the process of saying,"Hey, you need to tell some other people about this." So that's part of it as well. So anyway, you're a part of our family now. So we welcome you along and again, if there's any questions that you have along the way, please let us know, but thank you again for joining us on this first episode. We're so excited. I'm so excited that you're here and I look forward to passing along as much information as we possibly can to help you with your Osteoporosis diagnosis. So thanks again for joining us. And I look forward to seeing you in the next episode. Bye bye.