Based on the population of the city of Malmö, Sweden, we performed a retrospective cohort study. By choosing patients who had fractures of the upper end of the femur in the 1950s as an indication of senile osteoporosis, and by studying the roentgenographic records of their children from the 1950s and on we concluded that this type of osteoporosis is not a condition that is aggravated in certain families. Offspring of parents who had a hip fracture in the 1950s are not more prone to have fractures than a control group.