Preventing Broken Bones 

Bones are tough and resilient, but if you push them hard enough—if you fall on a hard surface, for instance—they can crack or break. Common sense and certain safety precautions, however, can head off a trip to the emergency room.

The CDC and other experts offer these safety tips to help prevent broken bones:

• Wear the right gear when exercising or playing a sport.

• Make sure your home is safe from hazards that can cause falls.

• Wear a seat belt when driving and make sure children are secured in safety seats or booster seats, depending on their age.

• Build up strong bones with good nutrition and exercise. Strong bones are less prone to fractures.

• Stay in good physical shape, because exercise increases muscle strength and reflex speed.

• Keep your weight in a healthy range.

These basic precautions can help prevent many of the common bone breaks that show up in hospital emergency rooms every day: wrists and ankles in young or middle-aged people, hips and wrists in older adults.

Twists and falls are the quickest way to a cast, says Charles L. Zeller, M.D., an emergency medicine doctor in Lansing, Mich. You put your hands out to break a fall, and you land on the heel of your hand. It's the wrist that breaks because it's the wrist that bends, absorbing the bending force. The hands absorb the flat impact force. 

Avoiding danger on the home front

Many falls take place in the home. This is especially true for elderly adults, as balance problems, poor eyesight, and brittle bones combine with household hazards to cause bone-breaking falls.

You can reduce the trip-and-fall factor by removing frayed rugs and removing extension cords that could cause a fall. Handrails help steady older adults and children on stairs. Proper lighting lets you see objects on the floor and avoid tripping over them.

Avoiding brittle bones

Strengthening bones is especially important for preteen and teen girls, because women who don't get adequate calcium and vitamin D as teens may be at increased risk for developing osteoporosis later in life. You can work to avoid osteoporosis, which makes bones brittle, through adequate calcium intake, exercise, and plenty of fruits, vegetables, and vitamin D throughout your life.  

Calcium requirements change during one's lifetime. The body's demand for calcium is greater during childhood and adolescence, when the skeleton is growing rapidly, and during pregnancy and breast-feeding. Postmenopausal women and older men also need to consume more calcium. According to the National Institutes of Health, children 1 to 10 years old need 800 to 1,200 mg of calcium a day. Those 11 to 24 years old need 1,200 to 1,500 mg per day. Adults ages 25 to 50 need 1,000 mg a day, and those 51 and older need up to 1,500 mg per day.

Your body uses vitamin D to absorb calcium. Being out in the sun for a total of 20 minutes every day helps most people's bodies make enough vitamin D. You can also get vitamin D from eggs, fatty fish, and vitamin D-fortified cereal and milk. If you think you need to take a supplement, check with your health care provider.

Treating a broken bone

Doctors still use X-rays to diagnose most broken bones, although more high-tech imaging devices may be used to detect subtle breaks, such as stress fractures. A stress fracture is a tiny fissure in bone often caused by sports overuse.

Most broken bones in an arm, leg, hand, or foot require a cast or splint. Heavy, awkward plaster casts have given way to brightly colored fiberglass casts. These are lighter, easier to apply and remove, and more appealing to children.

"In general, the older you are, the longer it will take a break to heal," Dr. Zeller says.

Doctors can use a variety of mechanical and biological methods to speed healing, says John F. Sarwark, M.D., a pediatric orthopedic surgeon in Chicago. Electric and ultrasound stimulation have been used on U.S. gymnasts.

The rate of healing "also depends on the type of fracture," Dr. Zeller says. A clean break will heal faster than a "comminuted" fracture, in which the broken bones have shattered into many pieces. This type of fracture may need surgery or traction.

The more complicated the break, the more reconstruction your surgeon must do. Grafts and graft substitutes are commonly used in bone reconstruction, Dr. Sarwark says. Genetically produced growth-promoting proteins may one day reduce the need for extensive surgery.