Biological variability of biochemical markers of bone turnover in healthy women

Abstract

To investigate day-to-day biological change of biochemical makers of bone turnover, we measured eight markers for 5 days in 10 healthy women. They aged 26-41 years (mean age; 31.1 years old), and had regular menstrual cycles. Fasting second void urine and blood was collected from them on five successive days. As serum marker, Estradiol (E2), intact PTH (i-PTH), Bone-specific alkaline phosphatase (BAP), and serum C-telopeptide (S-CTX) were measured. As urinary markers, urinary CTX (U-CTX), N-telopeptide (NTX), pyridinoline (Pyr) and deoxypyridinoline (Dpyr) were measured. Day-to-day physiological variations were different between bone markers. Variability of serum markers was less than that of urinary markers. Moreover, in the comparison of the same molecular marker, CTX, the variability of S-CTX was less than U-CTX. One should consider physiological variation of the marker to evaluate whether the change of the biochemical marker of bone turnover is significant or not.