Broken bones in infancy: child abuse or rickets?

John Cannell and Michael Holick published a paper pointing out that X-rays of broken bones in infants should not be used as definitive evidence of child abuse. Instead, bone biopsy should be used. X-rays miss rickets 80% of the time [Cannell, 2016]. This paper should help reduce the practice of taking infants with broken bones from parents suspected of abusing them when in fact what they need is treatment for rickets.

Cannell JJ, Holick MF. Multiple unexplained fractures in infants and child physical abuse. J Steroid BiochemMol Biol. 2016 Sep 15. pii: S0960-0760(16)30248-5. doi: 10.1016/j.jsbmb.2016.09.012.