• Karissa A Thal, Matthew Nudy, Eileen M Moser, and Andrew J Foy.
• From Department of Family and Community Medicine, Mount Nittany Physician Group, Bellefonte, PA (KAT); Department of Medicine, Division of Cardiology, Penn State College of Medicine, Hershey (MN); Department of Medicine, Penn State College of Medicine, Hershey (EMM); Departments of Medicine and Public Health Sciences, Penn State College of Medicine, Hershey (AJF).
• J Am Board Fam Med. 2023 Feb 8; 36 (1): 175185175-185.

BackgroundThere are multiple classes of pharmacologic agents approved for treatment of osteoporosis, but their costs vary widely, and systematic data on their efficacy compared with the traditional standard, bisphosphonates, for reducing fractures in postmenopausal women are lacking. The objective was to perform a systematic review and meta-analysis assessing the efficacy of denosumab compared with bisphosphonates.MethodsResearchers selected randomized controlled trials (RCTs) comparing denosumab to bisphosphonates that included information on clinical and/or osteoporotic fracture events over the follow-up period. Each clinical outcome was meta-analyzed using a fixed-effects analysis, with clinical and osteoporotic fractures as the outcomes of interest. A meta-regression was performed using change in bone mineral density (BMD) as the moderator variable.ResultsSeven RCTs were included. Denosumab was not associated with a reduction in clinical or osteoporotic fractures compared with bisphosphonates. There was no association between the change in BMD with denosumab and bisphosphonates and denosumab's effect on both osteoporotic and clinical fractures.DiscussionExisting data do not support the use of the more expensive denosumab as a first-line agent over bisphosphonates for reduction of fractures in postmenopausal women with osteoporosis. One limitation in this study was each RCT was not individually powered for fracture incidences.© Copyright by the American Board of Family Medicine.

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