Loneliness shouldn’t be just bad for men’s mental health — it could be bad for his or her bones, too, in keeping with a recent study.
And while social isolation can have a negative impact on the bone health of men, this shouldn’t be true of ladies, the researchers found.
Dr. Rebecca Mountain, of Maine Health Institute for Research in Scarborough, Maine, was lead researcher on the study, as multiple outlets reported.
The study was presented on Sunday at ENDO 2023, the Endocrine Society’s annual meeting, in Chicago, Illinois.
“Social isolation is a potent type of psychosocial stress,” said Dr. Mountain in an announcement, “and is a growing public health concern, particularly amongst older adults.”
She also said, “Even prior to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has significantly increased the prevalence of isolation and loneliness, researchers have been concerned a couple of rising ‘epidemic of loneliness,’” as SWNS reported.
Social isolation, she also said, is related to an increased risk for a lot of health conditions, including mental disorders, in addition to higher overall rates of illness and death.
“Previous clinical research,” she said, “has demonstrated that psychosocial stressors, and subsequent mental health disorders, are major risk aspects for osteoporosis and fracture, which disproportionally affect older adults.”
She added that the impacts of social isolation on “bone, nonetheless, haven’t been thoroughly investigated.”
Within the study, researchers exposed adult mice to social isolation — meaning one mouse per cage — or grouped housing, with 4 mice per cage — for 4 weeks.
The scientists found that social isolation caused significant reductions in bone quality, including reduced bone mineral density, within the male mice — but not the feminine mice.
The article’s abstract indicated that “isolated male mice had signs of reduced bone remodeling represented by reduced osteoblast numbers [cells that form new bones], osteoblast-related gene expression and osteoclast-related gene expression. Nonetheless, isolated females had increased bone resorption-related gene expression, with none change in bone mass.”
More study is required on the subject
Dr. Mountain said, “Overall, our data suggest that social isolation has a dramatic negative effect on bone in male mice, nevertheless it may operate through different mechanisms or in a unique timeframe in female mice.”
She added, “Future research is required to grasp how these findings translate to human populations.”
She also said, “Our work provides critical insight into the consequences of isolation on bone and has key clinical implications as we grapple with the long-term health impacts of the rise in social isolation related to the COVID-19 pandemic.”
The Endocrine Society is a worldwide community of physicians and scientists “dedicated to accelerating scientific breakthroughs and improving patient health and well-being,” the group says on its website.
Maine Health Institute for Research, for its part, supports and encourages a “broad spectrum of research,” the group says on its site, “starting from basic laboratory-based research through translational research, which works to use basic discoveries to medical problems, to clinical research, which studies the direct application of latest drugs, devices and treatment protocols to patients, to health services research which seeks to make use of research methods to assist improve and evaluate health care delivery programs and recent technologies.”
