Duchess recalls 'agonising' deaths of mother and grandmother to bone disease

The Duchess said that as a young woman she had been “blissfully unaware” of the causes and devastating effects of osteoporosis, but warned that it is too late to attempt to build up bone strength beyond the age of 30.

The disease is suffered by approximately three million people in the UK, disproportionately affecting women.

It weakens bones, making them more liable to fracture, and in old people it can cause a “dowager” stoop.

The Duchess has previously described the “heartbreaking” experience of watching her mother shrink eight inches in her latter years before dying aged 72 in 1994.

Towards, the end of her life, Rosalind Shand became so stooped she could no longer properly digest food.

“Sadly, as I grew older, I learned a great deal more about osteoporosis at first hand, as I watched both my mother and grandmother suffer the pain and ignominy of this agonising disease,” the Duchess said yesterday.

“So what message would I send to my younger self, now that I have learned so much more about it?

“Eat a healthy diet with plenty of calcium and Vitamin D, and take plenty of exercise, both are crucial for strong and healthy bones.”

The foundations of strong bones are laid in people’s twenties.

After the age of 30 it is no longer possible to build bone strength, but only to maintain what strength already exists.

Statistics indicate that half of all women and one in five men develop osteoporosis after the age of 50.

Losing bone density is a normal part of the ageing process, but women are particularly susceptible due to the menopause.

The condition usually most commonly manifests in painful and slow-to-heal fractures of the wrist and hip, although in severe case even a cough or sneeze can cause a rib fracture of the partial collapse of the spinal column.

The Duchess of Cornwall became president of the National Osteoporosis Society (NOS) in 1994.

She previously described how “my family and I watched in horror as my mother quite literally shrank in front of our eyes.

“I believe that the quality of her life became so dismal, and her suffering so unbearable, that she just gave up the fight and lost the will to live.”

Born Rosalind Cubitt in 1921, the Duchess’s mother was the focus of one of the last great pre-war debutante balls, attended by King George VI and Neol Coward, in 1939, and went on to marry the war hero Philip Shand, with whom she had three children.

Her mother, Sonia Keppel, died in in 1986, aged 86, having also suffered osteoporosis for years.

The NOS advises eating most dairy products, green leafy vegetables, broccoli and baked beans to gain healthy amounts of calcium and vitamin D.

Weight-bearing exercise is also essential for bone health, the organisation said.