The effect of sequential therapy for postmenopausal women with osteoporosis A PRISMA-compliant meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials

摘要

Background: Osteoporosis, more likely to occur in postmenopausal women, is a chronic condition that usually requires a long-term treatment strategy, but the use of either antiresorptive or anabolic drugs should be limited to 18 to 24 months. Discontinuing antiosteoporosis drugs may result in rapidly declining bone mineral density (BMD). Therefore, many patients are treated with the sequential use of 2 or more drugs. However, whether switching treatment from anabolic to antiresorptive drugs or the reverse could maintain or further increase BMD; and whether the sequential therapy could outperform the monotherapy under the same treatment duration still remains unclear. Nowadays, no firm conclusions were drawn.