About 3 out of every 10 women aged 50 years old or over are likely to suffer from osteoporosis, but less than half of them visit their doctors to check up on their bone health, the Ministry for Health, Welfare and Family Affairs said Tuesday.

According to the Health, Insurance Review and Assessment Service (HIRA), an affiliate of the ministry, about 1.46 million people were diagnosed with the disease in 2008, up from 1.33 million in 2007. The exact breakdown by gender is still being calculated, but the agency has so far found that women by far outnumber men.

The institute studied the disease prevalence pattern on the basis of Statistics Korea data and suggested that 29.9 percent women could suffer from osteoporosis, assuming they live to be 100 years old. The figure is about 2.7 times higher than that of men's 10.7 percent.

"It is a widely known fact that women are more susceptible to it," Dr. Shin Chan-soo of Seoul National University Hospital, who audited the report, told The Korea Times. "Men have thicker bones and the loss of estrogen after menopause significantly impacts middle-aged women," he added.

However, women are reluctant to see doctors. "It seems that many people consider osteoporosis to be irrelevant to them," Park Chan-mi, a HIRA staff member, said. "Many males see it as a women's disease," she added.

Osteoporosis can be particularly dangerous when people suffer from broken bones. The report showed that 17 percent of women and 22.5 percent of men with osteoporosis die within a year after a hip fracture.

"Of course, there could be other reasons or preconditions that raise the mortality rate. However, the hip fracture accompanied by a long stay in bed could cause various problems such as secondhand infection, bedsores and other problems," The report acknowledged that osteoporosis - the reduction of bone mineral density, bone micro-architecture disruption and alteration of various proteins - can be, to a degree, prevented by calcium intake.