Something we hear often in the clinic is people being told that all they need to do for their bone density is to do weight-bearing exercise. 

The term “weight bearing” is super vague, but most people interpret it to mean any exercise that involves moving the weight of their own body against gravity (e.g. walking, hiking, yoga, etc). 

Now - for SOME people this will be adequate to build and maintain their skeletal strength. Absolutely. 

But if you have already been diagnosed with osteoporosis or osteopenia and you are using walking/ pilates/ yoga/ swimming / hiking as your main forms of exercise, it is likely that for you these are not enough to maintain your bone strength. 

It is true that people who walk probably have higher bone density in general than people who don’t, however, the strain on the bone from walking is most likely not large enough to facilitate laying down new bone, and in lots of cases, may not be large enough to prevent loss of bone, either.

This DOES NOT mean stop walking or doing yoga, because meting exercise guidelines for bone health matters, too (150-300 min a week minimum)! 

But it does mean you may benefit from adding another type of exercise to your week: the recommendation is adding strength training, a minimum of twice per week. It needs to be strength based exercise that targets the entire skeleton, and can be made progressively more challenging over time. The idea is that it needs to be stimulus that is novel or new for your skeleton, and so needs to be distinctly more load than it your bones have been exposed to in recent years. 

So if you currently do no exercise, and your bone density is declining, adding yoga or pilates might be enough to create a new strain on the bone and have an impact. If you are already doing yoga or pilates, and your bone density is still declining, you likely need to introduce something that challenges your muscles more i.e. is heavier and thus causes a larger strain on the bones. 

Check out our osteoporosis e-book (download link on the front page at www.fkbphysio.com) for more information. 

Note: not to be taken as medical advice & please seek tailored medical advice for your specific circumstances. 

References

1. Odilon Abrahin, Rejane Pequeno Rodrigues, Anderson Carlos Marçal, Erik Artur Cortinhas Alves, Rosa Costa Figueiredo, Evitom Corrêa de Sousa, Swimming and cycling do not cause positive effects on bone mineral density: a systematic review, Revista Brasileira de Reumatologia (English Edition), Volume 56, Issue 4, 2016, Pages 345-351, ISSN 2255-5021, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rbre.2016.02.013.
2. Hong AR, Kim SW. Effects of Resistance Exercise on Bone Health. Endocrinol Metab (Seoul). 2018 Dec;33(4):435-444. doi: 10.3803/EnM.2018.33.4.435. PMID: 30513557; PMCID: PMC6279907.