Bone Health Poor in Anorexic Girls with Depression

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Depression appears to further increase the likelihood that girls with anorexia will develop the bone-thinning disease osteoporosis, according to a report from Australia.

Individually, both anorexia and depression have been linked to osteoporosis. This led Dr. Jerzy Konstantynowicz, from The University of Melbourne and colleagues to think that perhaps that the presence of both disorders would increase the risk of osteoporosis to a greater extent than anorexia alone.

As they report in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, the researchers evaluated bone mineral density (BMD) in 45 girls with anorexia nervosa, including 14 who also had depression.

Consistent with previous reports, BMD in both groups was reduced compared that seen in the general population, the investigators point out. Moreover, subjects with depression had significantly lower values than those without depression.

Further analysis showed that the severity of depression was independently linked to BMD.

"To our knowledge, this is the first demonstration of a quantitative association between BMD and depression in anorexic adolescent girls," the researchers state.

They say that studies are now needed to see if antidepressants might "alleviate the deficit in BMD."

SOURCE: Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, September 2005.