Why choose Cook Children’s for pediatric bone health care
Our Bone Health Clinic is dedicated to providing specialized, compassionate care for children facing complex skeletal and mineral disorders. Whether a condition is genetic or acquired, our goal is early intervention to ensure your child grows up active, resilient, and strong.
Comprehensive care for complex conditions
We specialize in evaluating and treating a wide range of rare and common pediatric bone issues. Your child may benefit from our expert help if they are living with:
- Genetic and neuromuscular disorders: These include muscular dystrophy, cerebral palsy, and achondroplasia or other skeletal dysplasias.
- Metabolic and mineral conditions: We treat conditions such as rickets, hypophosphatasia, or rare calcium imbalances like hypercalcemia or hypocalcemia.
- Bone fragility: We provide targeted treatment for children suffering from frequent fractures or conditions like osteogenesis imperfecta.
How bone and calcium disorders affect your child
These conditions can impact your child's health in various ways:
- Skeletal integrity: Weak bones that break easily or cause significant chronic pain.
- Growth concerns: Disorders that lead to poor growth or physical developmental delays
- Systemic health: Imbalanced blood calcium levels can directly affect overall energy, organ function and bone strength.
Our clinic cares for a diverse mix of new referrals and established patients with complex needs. Many of our patients are medically complex and see multiple specialists within our system; we pride ourselves on a coordinated approach to their care.
What you can expect
Your child receives age-appropriate, compassionate care targeted to their precise needs. At the Bone Health Clinic, you can expect highly organized, data-driven care. Our pediatric endocrinologist provides comprehensive medical oversight, integrating multispecialty information to drive diagnostic accuracy and tailor highly personalized treatment plans.
Our multidisciplinary team includes a pediatric endocrinologist, physical therapists, a registered dietitian, a pharmacy tech, a medical assistant and a nurse manager. Team members merge their different skill sets and expertise to ensure that no aspect of a patient’s bone health is managed in isolation. This coordinated approach allows us to offer your child the most effective care in a convenient setting for your family.
- Registered dietitians: Provide detailed nutritional assessments, specifically focusing on calcium and vitamin D intake, and establish guidelines for maintaining a healthy body weight to optimally support skeletal health.
- Physical therapists: Conduct essential functional assessments, including the six-minute walk test, to objectively monitor a patient's treatment response in conditions such as X-linked hypophosphatemic rickets (XLH) and hypophosphatasia (HPP). They also coordinate medical equipment needs and facilitate referrals to the Cook Children’s equipment clinic and outpatient physical therapy.
- Pharmacy team: Leads comprehensive patient and family education on complex medication regimens, including specialized teaching for adrenal insufficiency management.
We have the training and experience to treat the full range of bone conditions, including complex and rare diseases. Our doctors also have rare expertise in the growth and development of children with skeletal dysplasia.
Many children with bone disorders deal with mobility challenges that can make it difficult to get to appointments. When appropriate, our team offers follow-up visits via telemedicine to make it as easy as possible for your child to get the care they need.
Advancing pediatric bone health care
Our specialists follow expert guidelines to screen for, evaluate and treat bone disorders. We offer:
Diagnosing a bone disorder starts with a thorough physical exam. We also use specialized tests, such as bone density scans, laboratory studies and genetic tests, to confirm diagnoses.
Proper nutrition is crucial for bone health. Your child may require nutritional assessment and counseling from our dietitian.
Many children with bone conditions benefit from medications that increase bone strength and lower fracture risk. Your child may take medicines by mouth or get them intravenously (through an IV). Therapies prescribed in our clinic include:
- Asfotase alfa (Strensiq®)
- Bisphosphonates
- Burosumab-twza (Crysvita®)
- Somatropin (growth hormone)
- Vosoritide (Voxzogo®)
When needed, your child has access to additional specialists through Cook Children's. We may refer your family to Audiology, Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Orthopedics, Neurology or Genetics for additional care and resources.
Our physicians continually research the most promising bone treatments. Your child may have access to new therapies through open clinical trials.
Moments of magic
Hope and healing happen every day here at Cook Children's. Discover some of our highlights.
