Calcium and Vitamin D Found to Reduce Stress Fracture Risk.

A study conducted at the Creighton University Osteoporosis Research Center, Omaha, and published in The Journal of Bone and Mineral Research (2008;23:741-49) found that supplementing calcium and vitamin D decreases the frequency of stress factures. Study subjects female Navy recruit volunteers; stress fractures are a common and debilitating overuse injury seen in military recruits, and are also relatively frequent in the general population that participates in athletics. Researchers randomly administered 2,000 mg per day of calcium and 800 IU per day of vitamin D or a placebo to 5,201 Navy female volunteers. A total of 309 subjects were diagnosed with a stress fracture, an incidence of 5.9 percent per eight weeks. Using intention-to-treat analysis by including all enrolled subjects, researchers found the calcium and vitamin D group had a 20% lower incidence of stress fractures than the control group (5.3% and 6.6%, respectively). The per protocol analysis, including only the 3,700 recruits who completed the study, found a 21% lower incidence of fractures in the supplemented versus the control group (6.8% and 8.6%, respectively).Cal Plus is a comprehensive formula of calcium and other minerals and nutrients that support bone mineral density.