The Life of Bones

The National Institute of Nursing Research has awarded a three-year, $150,000 grant to the University of Alabama at Birmingham to examine the effects of diet and exercise on reducing bone loss'known as osteopenia, or osteonecrosis'among HIV-positive people. The university is already studying how diet and exercise affects HIV-related lipodystrophy and will expand the research to include bone loss. 'Although we're not sure why, [bone loss] is more prevalent among individuals with HIV than it is among the general population,' says lead investigator Barbara Smith, Ph.D. 'We believe that exercise and diet, in addition to its other health benefits, may help to prevent bone loss or at the very least slow bone loss among these individuals.' Geneva Turner of the School of Nursing at Tuskegee University in Tuskegee, Ala., will serve as coinvestigator on the study. The project will continue as a joint partnership between the faculty and students at the two schools.