Classification of osteoporosis. Risk factors. Clinical manifestations and differential diagnosis

Abstract

The fact that there are multiple factors that can intervene in the ethiopathology of osteoporosis, together with its scarce clinical expression until complications –fractures– are produced, poses a practical problem in medical practice when it comes to identifying those persons at risk of osteoporosis. These aspects, together with the difficulties in obtaining access to a complementary test that would confirm the diagnosis and the overload of tasks in our clinic, mean that the disease often passes unnoticed. Hence, in the section on diagnostic orientation of osteoporosis we attempt to clarify and give cohesion to this approach, offering highly useful guidelines for suspecting the presence of the disease and patterns of action that will make it possible to diagnose in a more efficient and accurate way.