Endocrine Abstracts

Introduction: Calcium intake is important to prevent osteoporosis in postmenopausal women. The objectives of our study were to evaluate the daily dietary calcium intake in postmenopausal Tunisian women, to compare diabetic and non-diabetic postmenopausal women in their calcium intake and finally to propose corrective interventions to promote calcium intake and minimize the complications of menopause.

Subjects and methods: The study involved 73 postmenopausal Tunisian women aged on average 61 years. Demographics and lifestyle were assessed with a questionnaire. Clinical and laboratory data were collected from medical records. Calcium intake was assessed by a food survey type ‘food story’ and estimated by the BILNUT software.

Results: Average daily calcium intake of our women was 723.8 mg/day. Sixty eight percent of these women had a daily calcium intake less than 800 mg/day. The average daily calcium intake in diabetic women was slightly lower than in non-diabetic (700.41 mg/day vs 778.04 mg/day). Diabetic women with HbA1c <7% had calcium intake slightly higher than those HbA1c >7% (741.25 mg/day vs 696.93 mg/day) but the difference was no significant.

Discussion and conclusion: The average calcium intake of our postmenopausal women is considered very low according to WHO. Only 1.3% of the patients had an intake deemed sufficient according to WHO. These alarming results are related to a multiparty and low educational context. These results encourage us to develop educational messages about the importance of calcium intake in postmenopausal especially diabetic women.