Drugs in Sport TV shows

[injuryupdate]

Two pretty interesting TV shows tonight on Drugs in Sport. From 8-10pm on FOX 8 there is the show High Performance on use of anabolic steroids in a trial group, and then a more standard documentary on ABC from 9.30-10.30pm.

[P McCrory]

WOW! Wasn't that fox 8 show hard core science! Mr. Injuryupdate can you tell me when we will find the write up in Cochrane database?

[Donald Trump]

When is the Doc from fox 8 going to hand my rug back? Man he was a sexc beast. I expect him to turn more than heads when he presents at the next AMA conference

[injuryupdate]

I was thinking something similar - that if they were happy to deal in testosterone that things like haircuts and dye and make up wouldn't have been too high tech.

The show was definitely Julius Sumner-Miller crossed with Big Brother, and in this sense it had some value. It would be a good show to give to any potential athletes to teach them about placebo effects etc.

Of course in two hours we might have expected to see some confidence intervals presented or a comparison of side effects, but potentially these might be presented in the written-up paper when it is submitted. It is of interest that many journals may reject this paper outright on the basis that the investigators have publicised the results prior to peer-review.

The most important finding that we DIDN'T get told (and maybe for ethics reasons wasn't tested for) was whether any of the athletes would have failed a drug test for high testosterone-epitest ratios in any group (esp. testosterone group, but also placebo & Tribulus groups). If most or all of the group would have passed because T:E ratio was still within the allowable limit, but the athletes showed statistically significant improvements in the 100m and shotput, then it is telling sprint athletes that small doses of anabolics (keeping your T:E ratio down) are worthwhile.

[Danny]

I missed the first showing but watched the second one on Monday.

A very rare research opportunity, would there have been any value in looking at a dose-response relationship? Maybe blowing off the "legal aids" group and using those extra bodies for a different (twice/tripple) dose of testosterone.

[sydunisportsmed]

In some ways, the greatest weakness of this program (from a science viewpoint) was also a strength from the interest side, in that it was a reality TV look at the personalities of the subjects. You could definitely surmise that some of the steroid boys were undergoing personality changes, but in a subjective way, and this sort of finding couldn't be written up in a scientific journal but was interesting nonetheless.

The "legal aids" group from a science viewpoint was a waste of time, because there was only n=1 in each group and they were unblinded. I suspect they were only included from a social responsibility viewpoint to let the gym junkies out there know that many legal supplements are available and they shouldn't all rush out to take anabolics.

The double/triple dose question is probably one that we already know the answer to - I'm sure there would be a dose/response improvement for anabolics, which is why most of the women's track world records from the mid to late 80s will probably never be equalled (as they probably involved large dose anabolics in athletes who would not have even been tested).

Still the question I wanted to know is - with these low dose given in the study, would some of the boys still have kept their Test/Epi-test ratio under the legal limit of 6 and therefore would have passed a drug test despite taking low dose steroids.