Performance Enhancers: The Safe and the Deadly

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Articles on Performance enhancing drugs

An additional study on dominant behavior assessed pair-housed male rats for dominance status based on their behavior and alterations in body weights (228). Throughout the study, the rats had limited social interactions on a daily basis. After 1 week, rats received nandrolone or placebo, and their behavior was observed over 2 months.

Effects of Performance-Enhancing Drugs

PED use appears to be far more prevalent than is generally believed and is widespread among nonathlete weightlifters. Therefore, epidemiologic surveys to determine the prevalence of PED use and the evolving patterns of PED use in the general adult population are an equally important priority. Recent studies have reported that a membrane-assisted isoform immunoassay test has excellent sensitivity (394, 395). Because this test is performed on a membrane support, we can use either antibodies or lectins that separate various glycoforms in conjunction with the immune detection to assess whether the erythropoietin is native or recombinant. Rats and mice display conditioned place preference to testosterone (260,–262), and male hamsters will self-administer testosterone to the point of death (263).

Drug Testing and Nutritional Supplements

DHEA continues to remain an over-the-counter nutritional supplement. Unfortunately, the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act of 1994 allows many steroid precursors to be sold over the counter with minimal regulation. Side effects of creatine can include gaining weight and cramps in the belly or muscles.

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Most of the issues involving the definition of performance-enhancing drugs in the past have been relatively clear cut. However, with the continuing advancement of medicine and particularly the application of psychotropic medicines, the sports psychiatrist will need to become an integral player in this complex social, moral, and medical drama. Psychiatrists who work with professional athletes will be faced with unique challenges that must be identified, acknowledged, and acted upon in agreement within the sport to ensure the integrity of the profession. CLA is a type of fat that athletes take to help reduce muscle damage and increase lean body mass after exercise. The supplement is especially popular with bodybuilders, who use it to enhance recovery.

Risk Factors

Looking toward the Olympic games and beyond, there will no doubt be scandals involving doping by individuals, sometimes at the behest of their organizations. In cases when designer drugs are used to avoid detection, such compounds would not have been clinically tested for safety by their very nature and would therefor pose a risk to athletes’ health. But as sports organizations continue to be creative with the pharmacology they deploy, science will continue to equip anti-doping authorities with the knowledge and analytical capabilities needed to detect performance enhancing drugs. Maximizing these capabilities will serve as a deterrent to minimize doping, promote health in sport, and preserve a semblance of fairness. Given the potential financial rewards of athletic success, it’s no surprise that we’ve been witness to a seemingly endless procession of allegations and scandals. The complicity of medical professionals and shadowy labs is often involved, and a 2015 report from the International Cycling Union (UCI) found the sport’s own governing body bore significant responsibility.

• ” Furthermore, if the governing bodies deny athletes effective and standard treatment for psychiatric disorders, are they discriminating against the mentally ill?
• However, data on steroid misuse among young students are available from the NIDA-supported Monitoring the Future Survey.

If so, who is ethically responsible to define this subtle issue and enforce fair policy? It seems that the burden falls less on the athlete, who is likely to be naïve to these implications, and more on the clinical experts who create policy with each sport’s governing body. While scientists were busy improving techniques to detect the anabolic-androgenic steroids they knew about in the early 2000s, Barry Bonds was Performance Enhancing Drugs busy hitting home runs. Little did the MLB know that behind the scenes, Bonds and other athletes had been using a newly synthesized steroid, tetrahydrogestrinone (THG), designed specifically for potent anabolic effects and with anti-doping testing protocols in mind. Dubbed “The Clear”, THG could not be detected in urine initially because the anti-doping program had no knowledge of its existence or metabolites.

Studies have also reported interaction of AAS with σ-receptors (257). The function of these receptors remains poorly understood, although there is some overlap with the opioid system (257, 258). These sites are recognized by neurosteroids produced endogenously in the brain. AASs also may interact with enzymes involved in neurosteroid metabolism, thereby modulating the action of these neurosteroids, which are known to produce effects on various behaviors (256, 259). Although our discussion has involved primarily field studies of illicit AAS users, some controlled laboratory studies have also examined the psychiatric effects of AAS.

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During an investigation, a sample of THG was extracted from the residue of a spent syringe and identified, after which an LC-MS/MS method could be easily developed for screening4. AASs are the most commonly used PEDs, with testosterone, boldenone, and trenbolone being the most frequently detected drugs among illicit PED users in the United States (Figure 4). Although boldenone is a veterinary steroid not approved for human use, this fact has not diminished its popularity among https://ecosoberhouse.com/ illicit AAS users. In the small subgroup of PED users who are elite athletes, WADA most commonly detects testosterone, stanozolol, and nandrolone, and the highest prevalence of positive tests occur in bodybuilding, power lifting, weightlifting, boxing, and kickboxing. Competitive athletes tend to use several other categories of PEDs in addition to AASs. For example, some competitive bodybuilders use diuretics (eg, furosemide and thiazides) to improve muscle definition onstage.