#1

I came across this news article.

This feels like something that’s easy to DIY. Have any of you used something similar experimentally?

#2

Maybe PEMF.
Still, why not just lifting heavy things (barbells).

  • Dead lifts
  • Squats
  • Shoulder shrugs
  • Overhead presses
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#3

It may not be enough.

#4

It looks like it was compared to a control group but not to a weight lifting group?

#5

Taurine + heavy weightlifting should do the work.

#6

TBH the jiggly belt sounds like a hell of a lot more fun! :laughing:

#7

Everything old is new again….

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image790×899 25.6 KB

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#8

To me the advantage of such devices seems like they can complement exercise in many ways:

  1. Helping us to work on those bones even while one is stationary or at work.

  2. Aid recovery from fractures. For example, using them when bones have healed but muscles haven’t yet strengthened

  3. Local application when there is limited room for exercise. For example, I tend to stop exercising if I feel soreness in my knee as I don’t want to risk injury. But maybe I can still go home and work on bone density for my legs.

#9

IF they work. End of the day, bone density from activity is likely a function of area under the curve. Most people, even if exercising, are unlikely to accumulate very many hours. I only deadlift and squat for maybe 40 minutes per week. So a device that can simulate exercise or stimulate bone formation in a passive manner for multiple hours per day would be huge. And as you said, for people with injuries etc, there’s real value.

I’ve done some digging for extra information. On the product website https://osteoboost.com there’s a bit more information about a small trial they did to get FDA clearance.

TRIAL PARTICIPANTS; 126 postmenopausal women with low bone density (64 active, 62 sham). Average age: 61.4 (range: 52-82).

TREATMENT PROTOCOL; Participants were instructed to self-administer Osteoboost 30 minutes per day, at least 5x/week. Study was 12 months total.

SUPPLEMENTS: Participants were provided two supplements to take daily: vitamin D and calcium.

In terms of results, CT and DXA scans were used to evaluate changes in bone strength and bone density over the 12 months of follow-up.

Bone strength at 12 months:
The sham group lost strength (-2.84%)
The treatment group lost -0.48%, P = 0.028

Spine bone density (by CT scan):
-1.97% in sham vs -0.29% in treatment, P = 0.016

Hip bone density:
-1.35% in sham vs -0.61% in treatment, P = 0.19 (note: not significant, quite big error bars here)

Compliance overall was 80% (not very high IMO) and they ended up with only n = 73 patients included in the final CT scans, based on patients who had done at least 3 sessions per week. Some pretty obvious “fiddling” of the data there by excluding a bunch of people.

The write-up is here: https://www.osteoboost.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/Clinical-Study-White-Paper-M-Jaasma-Rev-1.0.pdf

There’s also a small paper published: https://academic.oup.com/jbmrplus/advance-article/doi/10.1093/jbmrpl/ziae104/7723941

And a letter to the Editor with researchers complaining about their crappy study, selecting only favourable data, and over claiming and aggressive marketing: https://academic.oup.com/jbmrplus/article/9/5/ziaf051/8106833

Overall I am not too sure what to think. If everybody did their 30 mins 5x per week, would it have got better results? Probably IMO. But they’ve clearly decided these results are good enough to then push marketing etc.

I can’t help but wonder whether a simply massage gun, massage ball, or similar can accomplish the same thing. I’m sure this thing is very over-engineered and apparently they’re charging $1,500 for it with a regular discount down to $995. It’s also a bit silly with the “NASA” marketing.

#10

This week I am focusing on bone health, so I emailed the company to see if you can use it for more than 30 minutes and if you can be sitting or lying down.

I just thought I’d share their answer, here:

Osteoboost can only be used for 30 minutes total per calendar day. You can split the 30 minutes into two or more sessions in a day, but the device will automatically stop the vibration therapy after the calendar day’s total duration of use is 30 minutes. In our clinical trial, participants typically used Osteoboost in one 30-minute session per day. We have not yet studied if there are additional benefits to splitting it up into two 15-minutes sessions per day, but the literature suggests that this would be as effective, if not slightly more beneficial, to bone density and strength.

Osteoboost is limited to 30 minutes per day because that is the amount of vibration that we found to both elicited a benefit and to be safe. For Osteoboost, a 30 minute session is well under the ISO safety limit for vibration and our clinical study confirmed an excellent safety profile.

Also, all of our clinical studies to date have focused on using Osteoboost while in an upright position (activities that involve standing or walking), so we do not have data on Osteoboost use while seated. We do believe that Osteoboost will mechanically stimulate the bones of the spine and hips when seated, but since we do not have data, we do not know what level of benefit may be experienced.

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