After failing to master the weekday v weekend alarms on my FitBit Charge HR I was gently woken this morning to the sound of rain. Rain- in Seattle? Surely not?! Despite the assurance of a “random local” one of our party spoke to yesterday- this rain WAS the type that gets you wet- very wet! This slightly later than planned reveille meant that I unfortunately missed the much loved ASBMR-ECTS debate about whether T score diagnosis of osteoporosis should be modified to reflect intervention thresholds based on fracture risk. This always proves to be a very entertaining debate, with the debators often resorting to some underhand ‘comments’ about their opponents – and apparently this year was no exception! I’ll have to keep an eye out for the webcast.
The concurrent plenary sesssions in the morning were really intereting with new insights into the role of PTH in osteoprogenitor number and differentiation; peripheral nerves involvement in heterotopic ossification; beta-catenin signalling in ankylosing spondylitis and how reduced osteoclast TGF-beta in ageing impairs bone resorption and formation coupling through reduced Wnt1 expression.
Another MTP session before lunch, which although more didactic than interactive was a very insightful in using mouse models to define key osteoporosis genes.
Lunch gave the opportunit to chat to a few of the locals, including Little Red Riding Hood who was here for the geekgirlcon15!
After browsing the >450 posters ( I kid you not!) and a chat with a Geordie Barista/Hollywood actor (!)whilst ordering my chai latte, the afternoon session on my favoutite bone cells, osteoclasts, did not disapppoint with among others a great talk from Megan Weivoda about the expression of Wnts in osteoclasts.
The final concurrent session of the day delivered some interesting talks on Skeletal ageing- it seems that microRNAs are the hot topic this year!
After a dinner of Fish and Chips and a non-alcoholic German Wheat beer at Pike Place Brewery, we headed to the ASBMR social Seattle Rocks! Enough said!
DrG
The Gartland Lab 
