Lifestyle Measurements, and Public Health Strategies for Early Prevention of Bone Disease in Young Adults

Abstract

Bone health is critically important to overall health and quality of life. The best protection against age-related bone loss and consequent fracture risk is to achieve appropriate peak bone mass (PBM) at skeletal maturity. Approximately 20-40% of lifestyle choices influence adult PBM. Addressing lifestyle-related risk factors during adolescence and young adulthood may be the most important primary prevention strategy to reduce the risk of future osteoporosis. Known risk factors include low calcium, vitamin D and physical activity levels as well as high salt and excessive consumption of alcohol. New technologies can be used to measure bone-related lifestyle risk factors but it is important that these technologies produce accurate and reliable data. The participants for the studies in this thesis are a sub-sample from a larger cross-sectional study of young adults aged between 18 and 30 years. For three consecutive days, eligible participants wore an Autographer wearable camera and a wrist-worn Actigraph GT9X Link accelerometer and recorded their diet using a text entry app. On the following day, research dietitians conducted three 24-hour dietary recalls using the automated online ASA24 Australia program. The objective of this research is to employ and validate new technologies for the measurement of lifestyle risk factors associated with the prevention of bone disease in young adults.