Serum Osteocalcin: a Specific Marker for Bone Formation in Postmenopausalosteoporosis

Elderly patients often are unable to enjoy pain free physical activity due to various orthopedic problems. The orthopedic problems in the geriatric group comprises, bone disease due to metabolic conditions such as osteoporosis and osteomalacia, fractures peculiar to old age, degenerative disorders and metastatic bone disease. With the increase in life expectancy, osteoporosis has become a formidable public health problem in India and a multidisciplinary approach is needed for its management. Osteoporosis is one of the major problems facing women and older people of both sexes. The morbid event in osteoporosis is fracture. Various biochemical markers are now available that allow a specific and sensitive assessment of the rate of bone formation and bone resorption of the skeleton. Although these markers are not recommended for use in diagnosis of osteoporosis yet, they appear to be useful for the individual monitoring of osteoporotic patients treated with antiresorptive therapy. Biochemical markers provide valuable insight into the complexities of bone metabolism i.e. dynamic status of bone remodeling. It is also stimulating the search for new analytical methods (or markers) to unlock what has, for many years, been a relatively closed world for clinical biochemists: bone metabolism and biochemical markers of diseases.This brief review will provide detail information about current and specific bone formation marker i.e. osteocalcin.