If you keep up with health news you have heard about the benefits of calcium. Calcium is needed to keep you bones strong, it can help prevent osteoarthritis, it can aid in the treatment of arthritis, it benefits you heart and can help you loose weight just to name some. But what is the best way to get the calcium you need.

A new study in American Journal of Clinical Nutrition suggest that calcium from food sources may be absorbed better in the your body than calcium from supplements. Women with health diets had higher bone density than those who took in larger amounts of total calcium from supplements. The researchers in the study ask 133 postmenopausal to keep a record of their diet for a week. After that they had their bone mineral density checked.

There were three groups identified in the study.

 Women who received at least 70% of their calcium from food sources.
 Women who received most of their calcium from supplements.
 Women who had a balance of calcium from food and from supplements.

Interesting was that the women who took in the least amount of total calcium (830 milligrams) but got their calcium from a healthy diet had stronger bone density than women who took in a lager total amount of calcium (1030 milligrams) but got their calcium mostly from supplements. The women who got their calcium both from a healthy diet and from supplements had the highest bone density but also took in the highest amount of calcium (1620 milligrams).

The conclusion the authors made is that the best way to get your calcium is from food. I am not sure that the study supports this conclusion. Yes, the women who had a calcium rich diet but did not take a supplement had a higher bone density than those with a calcium poor diet but took calcium supplements. It is interesting to note that the women who did both had the highest bone density. This suggest that a calcium rich diet alone is not enough. The simple truth women are living longer after menopause than ever before and postmenopausal women need more calcium and if they do not take enough in then the body looks to bones to meet it’s calcium needs.

I believe the conclusion should be make sure you have a good calcium rich diet and do not forget to take your calcium supplement. Doing both in combination should help keep your bones strong.