Introduction
Osteoporosis is a common disease that affects more than 10 million Americans today. Osteoporosis has most likely affected either you or those close to you. In order to address these concerns, anabolic or antiresorptive therapies were used as a solution, but over the last decades, there was a problem that occurred when taking the anabolic medication since it also promoted bone resorption which made the effects of bone formation less effective. This is where Romosozumab comes into action. Romosozumab or Evenity deals with that issue since it has anti-resorption qualities.
Osteoporosis
Osteoporosis is essentially the condition in which your bones become brittle or very fragile. Old bones are constantly being broken down while new bone is constantly being made. When you are younger, you are creating more bone mass than you are breaking down bone. As you grow older, that creation of bone mass steadily grows slower. Typically osteoporosis occurs to those of old age since they tend to not make enough bone mass. With osteoporosis, bone loss happens at a higher rate than with bone growth. The name of the bone disease ties into what it is since it means porous bone. It is called porous bone due to how healthy bones look like honeycomb, whereas osteoporosis bones have much larger holes and spaces. People typically don’t know they have osteoporosis since they can’t feel their bones being weakened until facing the first signs such as breaking a bone or the height of their spine decreases.
Evenity
Romosozumab is a treatment that was approved by the FDA in April 2019. The treatment works by injecting two syringes once a month for a year. In previous treatments, drug therapy was limited to antiresorptive agents, which was used to slow down bone loss. There was also the anabolic medication that was previously mentioned wherein it helped to increase bone formation but had the problem of bone resorption which is basically motivating breaking down the old bone. To fix this issue, Romosozumab has the simultaneous ability to help regulate bone metabolism and decrease bone resorption. Evenity was essentially approved to treat postmenopausal women who had high rates of fractures. The treatment will reduce that risk, but it’s side effects include joint pain and headache, with an additional risk of heart attack, stroke, and cardiovascular death.
Conclusion
Romosozumab has made treatment for osteoporosis much easier as it has improved upon the last medications’ downfalls. Although it is shown to help treat mainly women–one of the main people at risk of osteoporosis–as it is a more current medical advancement, it lacks long-term data. That doesn’t disregard its credibility since it has shown mainly positive effects whether in the trials or more prominent cases.
Diana Manzanes, Youth Medical Journal 2020
References
“Learn What Osteoporosis Is and What It’s Caused By.” National Osteoporosis Foundation, 25 Sept. 2020, http://www.nof.org/patients/what-is-osteoporosis/.
“Osteoporosis.” Mayo Clinic, Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research, 19 June 2019, http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/osteoporosis/symptoms-causes/syc-20351968.
“#1 Dual-Acting Osteoporosis Drug.” Cleveland Clinic Innovations – Top 10 Medical Inventions | Cleveland Clinic Innovations, innovations.clevelandclinic.org/Programs/Top-10-Medical-Innovations/Top-10-for-2020/1-Alternative-Therapy-for-Pain-Fighting-the-Opioi.
Commissioner, Office of the. “FDA Approves New Treatment for Osteoporosis in Postmenopausal Women at High Risk of Fracture.” U.S. Food and Drug Administration, FDA, http://www.fda.gov/news-events/press-announcements/fda-approves-new-treatment-osteoporosis-postmenopausal-women-high-risk-fracture.
David M. Slovik, MD. “A New Therapy for Osteoporosis: Romosozumab.” Harvard Health Blog, 17 July 2019, http://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/a-new-therapy-for-osteoporosis-romosozumab-2019071717339.
Youth Medical Journal 
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