Hip fracture and other predictors of anti-osteoporosis drug use in Norway.

UNLABELLED: This study aims to find predictors of anti-osteoporosis drug (AOD) use. Known risk factors of osteoporosis, i.e., age, hip fracture, and corticosteroid use were found to be predictors of AOD use, in addition to a number of other drugs used. Higher socioeconomic position did not favor the use of AOD. INTRODUCTION: This study deals with studying predictors of anti-osteoporosis drug treatment in Norwegian women and men. METHODS: All Norwegian women and men≥50 years were included (n=1,407,392). Data were taken from different data sources, (1) the Norwegian Prescription Database (drug use in 2004-2005); (2) the Nationwide Census 2001 (marital status, education and resident county); (3) the National Hip Fracture Database (hip fractures 2003-2005); and (4) the National Population Register (date of death/emigration). We estimated the hazard ratios (HR) for incident treatment by Cox proportional hazard regression. RESULTS: In 2005, 10,332 women (1.5%) and 1,387 men (0.2%) were new users of anti-osteoporosis drugs (incident treatment). Age was a statistically significant predictor of incident treatment in both women and men, with HR ranging from 1.7 to 3.2 (per 10 years). A middle educational level in men strongly predicted incident treatment [HR 2.0 (CI 1.1-3.8)], but not in women after full adjustment. A previous hip fracture, increasing number of drugs used and use of corticosteroids were all predictors of incident treatment in both genders after adjustments. Corticosteroid use [HRwomen=4.0 (CI 3.8-4.2)] had a higher HR for incident treatment than hip fracture [HRwomen=2.0 (CI 1.8-2.3)]. Marital status and area of residency were not predictors of incident treatment in either gender, after adjustments. The predictors of prevalent treatment were only slightly different from incident treatment in 2005. CONCLUSIONS: Age, previous hip fracture, number of drugs used, and use of corticosteroids were positively related to treatment in both genders. In men, a middle educational level predicted treatment.

No evidence for the presence of tissue factor in high-purity preparations of immunologically isolated eosinophils.

BACKGROUND: To date, there is no unequivocal opinion on whether human eosinophils express tissue factor (TF). Therefore, we studied the expression of TF protein and activity in resting or stimulated immunologically purified human eosinophils. METHODS AND RESULTS: By use of immunologic isolation, we achieved over 96% purity of eosinophil preparations, and contamination by CD14-positive cells was below 0.3%. Flow cytometric [fluorescence-activated cell sorting (FACS)] analysis of eosinophils revealed no surface expression of TF antigen in resting or stimulated eosinophils. Immunoblotting of eosinophil lysates did not show any TF protein under resting or stimulated conditions. The lysates of resting or stimulated eosinophils contained no detectable levels of TF procoagulant activity. In contrast, monocytes, stimulated in plasma or medium, possessed readily detectable TF levels on the cell surface and in cell lysates as detected by FACS and immunoblotting. This was active TF antigen, as confirmed by TF activity assay (19.2 +/- 4.2 and 28.6 +/- 3.1 mU per 10(6) cells, stimulated in medium or plasma, respectively). We found no detectable TF mRNA levels in resting or stimulated eosinophils by real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR), whereas in monocytes TF mRNA levels were significantly increased after stimulation. CONCLUSIONS: Our data indicate that there is no evidence for TF expression in high-purity preparations of immunologically isolated eosinophils.