| Objectives To explore the effects of four types of exercise intervention (i.e., weight-bearing training, body weight training, jumping and fast walking) on bone mineral density (BMD) in postmenopausal women with osteoporosis, and to compare the effects of different exercise on the bone mineral density of femoral neck and L2-4 of lumbar spine. Methods Fifty-one postmenopausal women with osteoporosis were recruited and assigned into five groups. The 12-week training programs were delivered to the participants in the four intervention groups, respectively, but not the control group. Bone mineral density of the femoral neck and lumbar spine was measured using a GE dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry densitometer at baseline and post-intervention. The intragroup comparisons were performed using paired sample T-test for normally distributed data and Mann-Whitney test for non-normally distributed data. Comparison among groups were conducted using one-way ANOVA or rank sum test on the differences in BMD at pre- and post-intervention. P <0.05 was set as statistically significant. Results Compared with baseline, femoral neck and lumbar spine L2-4 BMD in all the intervention groups increased after intervention, while BMD in the control group decreased. The increase rate of femoral neck BMD in relative to baseline in the four intervention groups were: weight-bearing training (1.91 %), fast walking (1.34 %), body-weight training (0.72 %), and jumping (0.24 %), while such rate for lumbar spine L2-4 BMD were fast walking (29.07 %), jumping (11.17 %), weight-bearing training (4.22 %), and body-weight training (0.01 %). Conclusion Exercise could effectively alleviate the loss of bone mass in postmenopausal women with osteoporosis. Different types of exercise had different effects on bones in different parts. Weight-bearing training showed better effect on femoral neck BMD improvement whereas fast walking had better effect on lumbar spine BMD. The effects of impact-training such as fast walking and jumping were better than that of the non-impact load training (weight-bearing and body-weight training) for BMD of the lumbar spine. Among the two non-impact load training, weight-bearing training was better than the body-weight training on BMD of the femoral neck and lumbar spine. |