Prescriptions
Avoid steroids to keep body healthy
By Landis Lum
Looking for an easy way to get buff? Thinking about using steroids to build muscle bulk and definition? Think again.
Men will want to realize that research indicates anabolic steroids will reduce the size of your testicles, increase the size of your breasts and, in teenagers, reduce eventual adult height (from abnormally early closure of the growth plates of bones). And this is just the beginning.
Steroids increase blood clotting, which can lead to strokes, heart attacks and even loss of limbs.
Women may get abnormal facial hair and deepening of the voice, which may be permanent. Male-pattern baldness (often permanent) may occur in both sexes.
I talked to Hoku, a friend of my nurse, who told me that she could tell whenever another friend was on steroids. He would get more obnoxious and argumentative. Many steroid users indeed experience irritability, aggressiveness, depression, mood swings and even psychosis.
Hepatitis, liver cancer, reduced sperm counts and dangerous changes in blood fats (such as cholesterol) may also occur. Hyperactivity, anxiety, depression and steroid craving may occur whenever steroids are stopped, because of steroid withdrawal.
A common steroid used in Hawai'i is Cypenate. One problem with obtaining steroids through contacts at gyms or through "street pharmacists" is that you're never sure if what you're getting is pure and genuine.
If a steroid is contaminated with impurities, this can damage your internal organs or cause cancer, life-threatening infections (especially if injected) and even death. There are also many counterfeited steroids out there — compounds their sellers claim are DECA, Equipoise and Primo, for instance. What you get may either be considerably watered down, contain no steroid at all or be something completely different!
In addition, your sources may or may not be genuinely interested in your body-building success. One patient who used steroids in the past told me he felt most contacts were more interested in making a profit for themselves.
People using anabolic steroids typically use a combination of oral and injectable drugs during six- to 12-week cycles. People who share needles or use nonsterile injection techniques put themselves at risk for contracting dangerous infections, such as AIDS, hepatitis B and C, and bacterial endocarditis (a frequently fatal infection of the heart valves).
The simultaneous use of multiple steroid preparations is called "stacking," and the pattern of increasing a dose through a cycle is referred to as "pyramiding." Pyramiding may lead to doses 10 to 40 times greater than those used for medical purposes. Some users claim stacking and pyramiding maximize steroid receptor binding and minimize toxic side effects, but these benefits have never been scientifically proven.
These problems are not confined to grownups. The 1999 Monitoring the Future study — conducted by the University of Michigan's Institute for Social Research and financed by the National Institute on Drug Abuse at the National Institutes of Health — showed a 35 percent increase from 1998 to 1999 in the number of 10th-graders who said they had taken anabolic steroids. Steroid abuse is growing most rapidly among young women.
If your keiki is showing improbable gains in muscle bulk, mood changes, advanced stages of acne on the chest or back, early male-pattern baldness or elevated blood-pressure elevation, you should suspect anabolic steroid abuse and seek the advice of your family doctor.
For a potentially safer alternative to steroids, see the article I wrote April 15 on creatine.
Dr. Landis Lum is a family practice physician with Kaiser Permanente, and an associate clinical professor of family and community medicine at the University of Hawai'i's John A. Burns School of Medicine.
Hawai'i experts in traditional medicine, naturopathic medicine, diet and exercise take turns writing the Prescriptions column. Send your questions to: Prescriptions, 'Ohana Section, The Honolulu Advertiser, P.O. Box 3110, Honolulu, HI 96802; e-mail ohana@honoluluadvertiser.com; fax 535-8170. This column is not intended to provide medical advice; you should consult your doctor.
