I was diagnosed with treatment-related osteopenia (one stage off osteoporosis) last autumn as a result of chemopause. My doctor said that walking would be good and I have tried to do my best. The problem is that the only trial results I have been able to find where walking helped osteoporosis was one in Japan where the women took five separate hour-long walks a week. Try as I might, I just haven’t been able to do this, especially during the winter. Recently I ran across some evidence that vibration machines like Power plate have worked in post-menopausal women to help with bone strength and required much shorter times to have an effect. I was wondering if anyone had ever tried this and whether there might be any lymphoedema risk from vibrations going up to the arm (of course I would not vibrate the arm, but I need to do something about thin bones in my spine especially) and, to a lesser extent, my hip.
I was once told that in order to keep bones strong you need to do some form of impact excersise which would fit with what you’re saying. I have one fried who’s in her 70s (I’m 30s so no experience just yet, give it a few years though gulp) she was told to take calcichews (not sure how you spell that) to help replenish bone and the excersise is to stop them getting frail I believe.
Have you talked to your BCN about this, mines been a great source of info.
I was prescribed anti-osteoporosis medication as my bones were thinning too quickly. Has no-one offered you this?
I do all the walking and stuff, eat lots of calcium rich foods, but my doctor still decided I needed a bit of help.
Not sure about the lymphoedema and vibration - I vaguely remember reading somewhere recently that it’s not a good combo. Would a mini trampoline be any good? They are supposed to be good exercise and they are said to help with lymph flow, too.
I have osteopenia too and am on alendronic acid plus vit D and calcium. I was told to do lots of weight bearing exercise and had a programme worked out for me at the gym. I was told by a personal trainer not to use the power plate but she may be ulta cautious. My doctors didn’t give me any specific advice.
All the best
Anne
I have been using a power plate for the last 3 weeks.
I have lymphoedema in my arm and was asked to provide a letter from my doctor before starting. In the end I chose to sign a disclaimer because in my opinion what upsets one persons arm won’t necessarily affect another so I adopt a try it and see policy.
My arm hasn’t been affected at all so far, but the bonus for me is that I have had constant backpain since an LD reconstruction and for the last 2 weeks have not needed any painkillers. I attribute this to the power plate so I am going to carry on for a while.
I do 10 mins once or twice a week.
I gave up asking doctors advice on lymphedema a couple of years ago as they never seem to agree and have learnt to live with the condition without it causing to many problems.
In the end it all comes back to personal choice.
Jakey
I was also diagnosed with osteopenia last autumn. Because I was already under an eminent orthopedic consultant for a different problem (oesteomyalitis) and his other speciality is osteoporosis I was luckily prescribed bisphosphonates (had already been taking Calcichew D Forte).
Can’t help with your query about the power plate but I know that a study was done about jumping up and down for 20 times a day and apparently this had a clinically relevant benefit on bone strengthening. No good for me (problems with leg) but sounded like sensible (and more to the point achievable) way of strengthening the bones.
Good luck and keep us posted on the outcome please. PS. Maybe LSN lymphoedema.org/lsn/ might be able to help.
I recently joined a gym and told the instructor there about my history of breast cancer and she advised me to stay away from the Powerplate. I think it was to do with the fact that it speeds up lymphatic drainage and could spread cancer cells (if there were any there). There is also some information about it in the small print on the poster behind the machine and these should be available in every gym.
I don’t want to sound alarmist because there is no problem if there is no cancer around, but it is just something to be very mindful of.
Thanks for all of your ideas. I am trying to avoid the medication if possible because I have looked into it and am not happy with the known side effects. In any event, my oncologist wasn’t terribly keen on me going on bisphosphonates right away. My attitude towards lymphoedema has been to stop anything at the first sign of trouble and at four years out I am ok. I have been able to do alot more than expected and have found that somethings that probably would not be advised, such as digging in the garden, actually made my arm feel alot better. I find that periods when I have to do alot of typing are my big problem time. They really don’t seem to know enough about lymphoedema. I hadn’t heard about jumping up and down twenty times, but I guess that that could work. Perhaps a bit higher impact for a shorter period would work. The time is the problem. I wish they had done a trial with people running, since I would find that much easier to fit in. Jakey, could you let me know how you get on?
Christine…how lovely to see you posting again…have quite missed your erudite and articulate posts and was only thinking of you today - well, they do say in this Forgotten Corner of Cornwall, we all become white witches.
I “don’t do gym”, although did play squash at a competitive level in my 20’s and 30’s so must have built up some bone mass, so can’t comment on the power plate machine…but get plenty of normal walking exercise around the Fort - seems like half a mile to take our recycling stuff down to the harbour and hubby can’t walk more than 50 yds, so I am the garbage collector!
I stopped Arimidex 2 months ago, after 4 yrs on it (see my other post this evening on the secondaries thread) because of severe hip, feet and hand pain. The pain did not “miraculously” go - it was the Arimidex s/e’s. I have no problem with Alendronate or Calcichew/Vit.D3, been on it 3 yrs now. Just hate taking it because I have to wait a half hour on rising before I can have a cup of tea. Sad soul, eh?
Hope you can get some benefits from the power plate…
Hugs,
Liz.
Actually, all of these posts made me go back to the drawing board because I realised that maybe my oncologist wasn’t so great when it came to managing my bone issues (even though he has written articles on how oncologists should be better at handling bone issues!). I went looking in Medline for that study that said that jumping up and down was enough. I didn’t find it, but I did find out that Power Plate seems mainly to rebuild bone density in hips, and it is my spine that is osteopenic. Fortunately, Medline did turn up a study that found a 2% in bone mass density over six months in the spines of women who walked on a treadmill at 70% of capacity for half an hour followed by 10 minutes of high-impact stepping just three times a week (google ‘Efficacy of a 24-week aerobic exercise program for osteopenic postmenopausal women’ to find the abstract. According to the abstracts, vibration exercise is much, much better than walking at building bones, but it is not necessarily better than more conventional higher impact exercises, so I think I will get a step and step video.
We have just had a Power Plate installed at my gym and I have had a couple of half hour sessions on it and am not really impressed. The instructor says it is good for preventing osteoporosis but I feel it is a lot of hype. Ever since I first had BC in 1990 and again in 2007 I have been going to the gym and doing cardio work and lifting weights and my last bone density scan was normal before I started Arimidex. In my opinion weight lifting (which could just be heavy shopping bags) biking and power walking are the best for prevention.
Without wishing to appear negative, I don’t think I’d be very keen on the weights (unless they are very light?) or heavy shopping bags and the risks of worsening or triggering lymphoedema.