Original title: Global, regional, and national burden of bone fractures in 204 countries and territories, 1990–2019: a systematic analysis from the Global Burden of Disease Study 2019
Researchers estimated how often fractures occurred and how much disability they caused across 204 countries and territories from 1990 to 2019. In 2019, there were 178 million new fractures, while the age-adjusted fracture rate had fallen since 1990. The number of people with fracture symptoms and the years lived with disability also rose, even as their age-adjusted rates fell. Lower-leg fractures were the most common and burdensome type, and fracture rates were highest among the oldest people.
Imagine counting how many people need help after a fall in several towns. If one town has many more older residents, its count may be higher partly because age changes the risk. In this paper, the raw counts show the total burden, while age-adjusted rates help compare places and years without letting differences in age makeup dominate the comparison.
The growing number of fractures affects patients, families, and health services that must provide care and rehabilitation. The study points to older people as a group at particularly high risk and says prevention, osteoporosis screening, and treatment could help reduce the burden.
The abstract reports estimates across countries, years, ages, and sexes, but does not describe the data sources, estimation methods in detail, or how complete the underlying records were. It does not establish why fracture counts changed or whether prevention, screening, or osteoporosis treatment would reduce them.
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Global, regional, and national burden of bone fractures in 204 countries and territories, 1990–2019: a systematic analysis from the Global Burden of Disease Study 2019 — Aimin Wu, Catherine Bisignano, Spencer Lewis James et al. — The Lancet Healthy Longevity — doi:10.1016/s2666-7568(21)00172-0
Abstract licence: CC BY
Explanation generated by Synthesis from the abstract — it is not the original paper.