The 2024 Bone Curriculum Symposium and the Pre-Symposium on Rare Bone, Calcium and Phosphate Disorders organised by the KBVR / SRBR Osteoporosis and Fracture Prevention Group will be held at the Aula in Ghent on 22 & 23 February 2024.

The Bone Curriculum Symposium is a continuous structured educational lecture cycle on bone. It includes bone biology, physiology, pathophysiology, calcium and phosphate metabolism, covers bone, calcium and phosphate disorders, osteoporosis, diagnosis, management and treatment.

The intention of the Bone Curriculum is to provide high quality continuous education for clinicians interested in, seeing or treating patients with osteoporosis or bone diseases and is a structured educational program for rheumatology and other bone-interested medical trainees. In this context, the lectures mainly cover up to date basic knowledge, overviews and reviews. Interactive participation is encouraged.

The Pre-symposium on Rare bone, calcium and phosphate disorders provides general information on rare bone, calcium and phosphate diseases to interested second-line clinicians and also intends to be an educational and exchange platform for dedicated bone specialists.

You can register here

Announcing the 33 rd Annual meeting of the Dutch Society for Calcium and Bone Metabolism! The meeting will take place the 8th and 9th of November 2023.  As always we will retreat in the beautiful forrest of  Zeist at Conference Center Woudschouten.  Stay tuned for our newsletter with abstract deadlines and possible award opportunities.

The ECTS Philippe Bordier Clinical Award is awarded to individuals who have made a significant clinical contribution to the field of bone and calcified tissue. And this year prof Carola Zillikens (Erasmus MC) received the award in Liverpool during the ECTS conference this april! For more information about the award of previous awardees, please look at https://ectsoc.org/grants-awards-funding/awards/ects-philippe-bordier-clinical-award/

Op het besloten gedeelte van de website zijn de foto’s geplaatst van de najaarsvergadering 2021! Alvast wat herinneringen ophalen voor de nieuwe najaarsvergadering 10 en 11 november 2022!

Afgelopen zondag , op het 49ste congres van de European Calcified Tissue Society heeft onze voorzitter, dr Natasha Appelman-Dijkstra de Iain T Boyle Award uitgereikt gekregen.
Deze award wordt uitgereikt aan jonge onderzoekers die een significante bijdrage hebben geleverd aan onderzoek naar bot en mineraal aandoeningen in de afgelopen jaren. (https://ectsoc.org/grants-awards-funding/awards/ects-iain-boyle-award/ voor het volledige jury report).
Appelman-Dijkstra kreeg de award  onder andere voor haar werk in de zeldzame aandoening Fibreuze Dysplasie/McCune Albright syndroom en het coördineren van de Europese registers voor zeldzame bot en mineraal aandoeningen (www.eurr-bone.com).

dr Maaike Schilperoort (LUMC/Colombia University) was presented with the Kyowa Kyrin best thesis award 2021 for her thesis: it’s about time.

The thesis targets various consequences of disruption of the internal biological clock, including the consequences on bone.  A consistent circadian rhythm is essential for long-term health, and chronic circadian disturbances have been strongly associated with cardiometabolic diseases and metabolic bone disturbances in humans.  This thesis provides insight into the role of circadian rhythm in the development of (cardio)metabolic diseases, and elucidates novel approaches to prevent diseases associated with circadian disturbances.  She discovered that strong rhythms in the expression of circadian clock genes within the bones of mice, were clearly disrupted by shifting light-dark cycles. Repeated shifts in light-dark cycle decreased plasma levels of markers for bone formation and resorption, indicative of a reduced bone turnover. Consistent with these observations,  abnormalities in trabecular bone structure and an increased cortical bone mineralization were found. Altogether, the bones of mice exposed to shifting light-dark cycles show an osteoporotic phenotype that may explain the increased incidence of bone fractures in shift workers.

Furthermore a disturbed glucocorticoid rhythm could also underlie the association between circadian disruption and osteoporosis. Experimental flattening of the corticosterone rhythm in mice tilted the balance in bone remodeling towards bone resorption, thereby reducing bone volume and density. The observed alterations in bone structure negatively affected the mechanical properties of bone, as reflected by a decreased bone strength and stiffness. Together, these results indicate that a disturbed glucocorticoid rhythm can indeed increase the risk of osteoporotic fractures. .This is not only relevant for shiftworkers, but also for patients that have a blunted endogenous glucocorticoid rhythm due to exogenous glucocorticoid administration. In these patients, well-designed chronotherapy with glucocorticoids may reduce osteoporotic adverse effects. The full thesis is available here. 

Dr. Maaike Schilperoort is currently working as a postdoctoral researcher at Colombia University, USA and therefore her award was collected by the supervisor of her bone experiments, dr Liesbeth Winter (LUMC).

Prof. Coen Netelenbos has been appointed honorary member of the Dutch Society for calcium and bone metabolism during our General Assemblee on the 12 th of November 2021.  We are greatfull for his commitment to the society for many many years.  Despite his retirement from clinical services prof Netelenbos is still very active in bone and mineral research resulting in many vivid discussions during our annual meetings.

Dr. Fernando Rivadeneira has been  appointed as professor of Translational Skeletal Genomics at the Erasmus MC- Faculty of Erasmus University Rotterdam. He will publicly accept his appointment on Friday 3 December 2021 with an inaugural lecture entitled: Embracing the randomness of collapse.

The ceremony will begin at 16.00 hrs promptly in the Aula, Erasmus building, of the university, Burgemeester Oudlaan 50, Rotterdam.

You can attend the inaugural lecture via livestream:

In het LUMC is de PAPS-studie (PAmidronate for Pain in Sternocostoclavicular Hyperostosis) van start gegaan. In deze studie wordt de werkzaamheid van pamidronaat dubbelblind vergeleken met placebo in Sternocostoclaviculaire Hyperostose (SCCH).

SCCH is een zeldzame botaandoening met een vooralsnog onbekende etiologie. De ziekte karakteriseert zich door een inflammatoir proces in het gebied van het sternum, de clavicula(e) en de ribben, waarbij door de inflammatie verhoogde botturnover plaatsvindt. Dit proces leidt uiteindelijk tot de kenmerkende hyperostose, en tevens op de lange termijn tot sclerose en mogelijk degeneratieve transformatie van het aangedane weefsel.

De PAPS-studie is open voor inclusie en er kan gericht verwezen worden naar het LUMC voor de duur van de studie, 12 maanden. Meer informatie over de studie voor patiënten is te vinden op www.scch.nl en op de website van het Centrum van Botkwaliteit van het LUMC.

Deze studie is mogelijk gemaakt door ReumaNederland en wordt uitgevoerd door dr. Liesbeth Winter(PI) en  dr.Natasha Appelman-Dijkstra en onderzoeker Anne Leerling. Bij vragen neem vooral contact op!

De NVCB is 30 jaar geworden en dat hebben we dit jaar digitaal gevierd. Helaas was een fysieke vergadering niet mogelijk maar dat mocht de ZOOM pret niet drukken. Diverse keynote speakers zoals Laurence Vico, Jack van Loon, Thomas Carpenter en Gabri van der Pluijm hebben zeer interessante presentaties gegeven en ook de ingestuurde abstracts waren weer van hoge kwaliteit. Deze najaarsvergadering was misschien wel de interactiefste ooit en heeft er in ieder geval voor gezorgd dat het bestuur kan gaan bijklussen als congresbureau. Toch hopen we jullie volgend jaar weer te zien op locatie om het glas te heffen. Tot 11 en 12 november 2021!