Project Teams and Working Groups

Awareness Campaign Project Team

This project team oversees the development and implementation of NBHA’s public and health professional awareness campaign, which will be aligned around the NBHA’s “20/20” vision to reduce fractures 20% by the year 2020 and secondary fracture prevention.

Secondary Fracture Prevention Initiative Project Team

This project team submitted a funding request to the Centers for Medicaid & Medicare Services Innovation Center on January 27 to request support to implement a Fracture Liaison Service (FLS) program in the Medicare beneficiary population. An FLS is a program led by nurse practitioners or other allied health professionals to ensure post-fracture patients receive appropriate diagnosis, treatment, and follow-up of their likely osteoporosis. This project builds on the successes of independent FLS programs that have been in existence for more than a decade in the U.S. and internationally at Kaiser Permanente and Geisinger Health System (U.S.), the U.K. and Canada that have all demonstrated both cost savings and outcome improvements. To enable rapid implementation, this project will utilize a number of tools from the American Orthopaedic Association’s Own the Bone program, a quality improvement program in operation since 2009 in the open health care system to address the osteoporosis treatment gap and prevent secondary fragility fractures.

Bone Turnover Marker Standardization Project Team

This project team is developing a position paper on the need to standardize bone marker sample collection procedures and establish a reference range for one bone formation and one resorption markers. This standardization will allow clinicians to have confidence in their use of bone turnover markers to help monitor osteoporosis treatment and assess future fracture risk.

Rare Bone Disease Working Group

This working group is exploring the development of potential projects and activities focused on rare bone disease that could be implemented through the NBHA.