Accelerated mineralization kinetics in children with osteogenesis imperfecta type 1.

Not much is known about the time course of mineralization in newly formed bone from healthy individuals nor in patients with bone disease. To investigate the early phase of mineral accumulation in human bone, we measured the mean mineralization content between double fluorescence labels (CaYoung) with quantitative backscattered electron imaging (qBEI) in human transiliac biopsy samples. Fluorescent labels for histomorphometric evaluation were administered over two 2-day periods separated by a 10-day-free interval, 4–5 days before biopsy procedure. We compared n = 19 children with osteogenesis imperfecta type 1 (OI, 6 girls/13 boys, age-range 2.2–14.1 years) with both a reference group of n = 38 healthy children (REF, 24 girls/14 boys, age-range 1.5–20.9 years) and an age-matched subgroup (n = 17) of the latter (CON, 5 girls/12 boys, age-range 2.0–14.7 years).