Can anyone help me with info about child hood rickets??

Question

last year my 6 year old went to the doctors because she was having pains in her leg and it was bowing.. which i had asked about for a couple of years and was told it is normal.. they told me she has rickets which is not common around here.. she is on med and nothing is workibg.. she has not grown at all in over a year in a half ( she looks 4).they broke her leg last year and rest it but now the upper part of her leg is doing it to.. i need to know where to get help ?? doctors around here no nothing about this and while they are learning how to deal with it my daughter is now having problems with her legs giving out.. if anyone knows where i can find help please let me know.. thanks

Answer 1

Rickets is the softening and weakening of bones in children, usually because of an extreme and prolonged vitamin D deficiency.

Vitamin D is essential in promoting absorption of calcium and phosphorus from the gastrointestinal tract, which children need to build strong bones. A deficiency of vitamin D makes it difficult to maintain proper calcium and phosphorus levels in your bones.

Your body senses an imbalance of calcium and phosphorus in your bloodstream and reacts by taking calcium and phosphorus from your bones to raise blood levels to where they need to be. This softens or weakens the bone structure, resulting most commonly in skeletal deformities such as bowlegs or improper curvature of the spine.

If a vitamin D or calcium deficiency is the cause of your child's rickets, adding vitamin D or calcium to the diet generally corrects any resulting bone problems for the child. Rickets due to a genetic condition may require additional medications or specialized treatment. It seems that your child's skeletal deformities are severe enough that she has already needed corrective surgery.

In the past, dietary vitamin D deficiency was the most common cause of rickets in the United States. Now, with the increased use of vitamin supplements and the variety of foods fortified with vitamin D, vitamin D deficiency cases of rickets have fallen.

Currently in the United States, conditions that impair vitamin D absorption such as the surgical removal of all or part of the stomach (gastrectomy) and celiac disease, in which the small intestine doesn't absorb certain nutrients from food, cause most cases of rickets. It is very important to test if your child suffers from celiac disease, which is a gluten intolerance meaning that your child cannot eat bread, wheat, or any other food containing gluten.

Other causes of rickets include:

Hereditary rickets (X-linked hypophosphatemia), an inherited form of rickets caused by the inability of the kidneys to retain phosphorus, or a complication of renal tubular acidosis, a condition in which your kidneys are unable to excrete acids into urine

Lack of exposure to sunlight, which stimulates the body to make vitamin D

My first question is to ask you if you have checked for celiac disease and if your chld is getting enough sunlight. I would suggest taking your child to one of the top orthopedists in the country to find out what the root cause is and why she's not getting any better.