What should you do to keep your bones healthy?

Bone health is important. If we don't take care of our bones properly it could result in brittle weak bones and lead to osteoporosis at some point in life. Osteoporosis simply refers to the bones being less dense. When bones come to be in this brittle and less dense state there is more of a chance for bones to easily fracture. Fracture means that the bone breaks, a broken bone basically. This introduction to bone health comes from no particular source. This introduction is simply my knowledge and understanding based on my educational background and profession.

I can now provide you with some tips that will support bone health. Based on my educational background I can say that to support bone health you need to have an appropriate daily intake of calcium and vitamin D. Vitamin D is what will allow calcium to be absorbed into bones. Vitamin D is found in most milk and is also obtained from the sunlight. It does not take long to get your days worth of Vitamin D from the sun. I would say 10 to 15 minutes in the sunlight will give you all you need for the day. I can also say that exercise that is weight bearing in nature is of importance. When performing weight bearing exercises the body will respond by taking calcium from the bloodstream and bringing that calcium into bones. I will now go ahead and elaborate on these general thoughts of my own by using information from the CDC (Center for Disease Control and Prevention) website:

1. Have an appropriate daily intake of calcium and vitamin D: Good sources of calcium include dairy products, dark green vegetables such as broccoli, nuts (almonds in particular), and anything that is calcium fortified. The CDC has a chart that provides information regarding how much calcium you should be including in your daily diet. The chart gives this information based on age. It would be more efficient for you to visit the site and view this chart to find your needed calcium intake rather than me giving you all of that information on this blog. I will post the CDC website I have used for this section of the blog at the end of my blog.

2. Perform weight bearing exercises: The CDC lists some examples of weight bearing physical activities including walking jogging or running, tennis (the bones and muscles in your arms are working against gravity to activate the response of calcium being pulled into bones), jump rope, ball sports, dancing, hiking, and weight lifting. This section of my blog has also been supported by information from the same CDC website as the above section.

Reference:
Center for Disease Control and Prevention. (2008, December 3). Calcium and Bone Health. Retrieved
     on December 19, 2010 from http://www.cdc.gov/nutrition/everyone/basics/vitamins/calcium.html