Multimodal high-intensity gymnastics induced marked osteogenic impact for postmenopausal women

BACKGROUND: Multimodal training characterized by diverse, large, and novel bone strains improves bone mass, but after menopause the evidence is inconsistent. This intervention evaluated the osteogenic efficacy of multimodal high-intensity gymnastics for postmenopausal women.

METHODS: Thirty-three healthy women participated in a 19-week controlled intervention followed by 11-weeks detraining: Group I (N.=21): 3x30 min fully supervised and personalized gymnastics weekly (age 57.1±4.8 yrs; weight 64.5±8.1 kg; BMI 22.9±2.9 kg/m2; VO<inf>2max</inf> 30.3±3.9 mL/kg/min [mean±SD]). Group C (N.=12): Controls (age 57.9±3.9 yrs; weight 63.9±10.6 kg; BMI 22.7±3.0 kg/m2; VO<inf>2max</inf> 30.4±4.9 mL/kg/min [mean±SD]). Primary outcomes: lumbar spine (L1-L4) and total proximal femur (TPF) bone mineral density (BMD) (g/cm2) and markers of bone formation (procollagen type-I amino-terminal propeptide [PINP] and osteocalcin [OC] µg/L) and resorption (C-terminal telopeptide of type-I collagen [CTX-I], ng/L).

RESULTS: Post-intervention, percent ΔBMD (mean±SEM) were larger for I than C in L1-L4 (0.9±0.5% vs. -1.1±0.8%, P<0.05) and right (0.8±0.4% vs. -1.0±0.3%, P<0.005) and left (0.7±0.3% vs. -0.5±0.3%, P<0.05) TPF. Percent ΔOC (mean±SEM) were larger (P<0.005) for I than C after 3 weeks (11.7±20.5% vs. -9.3±19.4%), 12 weeks (23.7±17.6% vs. -11.5±29.0%) and post-intervention (18.0±25.9% vs. -14.8±28.6%). Percent ΔPINP and ΔCTX-I did not differ between I and C, despite consistent significant increases in PINP for I. Following detraining, percent ΔBMD between-group differences had increased further in L1-L4 (P<0.005) and right TPF (P<0.001).

CONCLUSIONS: The osteogenic impact of 19-weeks high-intensity gymnastics for postmenopausal women was significant and consistent regardless of the assessment method. Thus, gymnastics proved to be effective to counteract the postmenopausal BMD reductions.