The Association between Serum Uric Acid and Bone Mineral Density in Older Adults

OBJECTIVES: Uric acid has been found to be potentially protective in bone metabolism. We investigated the relationship between serum uric acid (sUA) and lumbar bone mineral density (BMD) among 4156 participants aged 60 years and over from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES). METHODS: To estimate the association between sUA and lumbar BMD, multivariate logistic regression analyses were conducted. Fitted smoothing curves and generalized additive models were also performed. RESULTS: We found sUA positively correlated with lumbar BMD after adjusting for other confounders. On subgroup analyses, stratified by sex and race/ethnicity, the positive correlation of sUA with lumbar BMD remained in both men and women, as well as in whites and Mexican Americans, but not in blacks. In blacks, the association of sUA with lumbar BMD was an inverted U-shaped curve (inflection point: 7.5 mg/dL). CONCLUSIONS: Our study revealed a positive relationship between sUA and lumbar BMD among most old adults. This association followed an inverted U-shaped curve among blacks.