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Abstract
Anabolic-androgenic steroids (AAS) are used to enhance physical performance and/or appearance. The aim of this study was to evaluate the influence of the concomitant use of alcohol, tobacco, cocaine, and AAS on blood lipid profiles of 145 asymptomatic male bodybuilders from the Northeast region of Brazil. Interviews, clinical exams, and serological evaluations were performed on all participants between 2007 and 2009. All subjects’ self-reported use of testosterone or its derivatives, 118 individuals reported alcohol intake, 27-reported cigarette smoking, and 33 confirmed cocaine use. Four subjects were users of all drugs at the same time. Higher levels of total cholesterol and LDL-cholesterol were observed among concomitant users of alcohol, tobacco, cocaine, and AAS. The study's limitations are noted.
THE AUTHORS
Paulo Adriano Schwingel, PhD, received his bachelor degree in physical education at Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS), Porto Alegre, RS, Brazil. He has received the MSc and PhD degrees in Medicine and Health in the Bahia's School of Medicine (FMB) at Federal University of Bahia (UFBA), Salvador, BA, Brazil. Currently, he is Adjunct Professor in the Department of Nutrition at University of Pernambuco (UPE), Petrolina, PE, Brazil. His primary interests include exercise training, anabolic-androgenic steroids, sports physiology, and metabolism.
Cláudio Cesar Zoppi, PhD, received his bachelor degree in physical education at State University of Campinas (UNICAMP), Campinas, SP, Brazil. He has received the MSc and PhD degrees in Functional and Molecular Biology consecutively in the Institute of Biology (IB) at UNICAMP. Currently, he completed his Postdoctoral in Physiology at UNICAMP and is Teaching and Research Assistant at UNICAMP. His primary interests include exercise training, metabolism, obesity, skeletal muscle, and pancreatic islets.
Helma Pinchemel Cotrim, PhD, is a medical doctor and Associate Professor of Gastroenterology and Hepatology in the Bahia's School of Medicine (FMB) at Federal University of Bahia (UFBA), Salvador, BA, Brazil. She holds a PhD in Medicine at UFBA and she completed her Postdoctoral in Hepatology at Stanford University, CA, USA. Currently, she is a leader of the Research Group to Study Nonalcoholic Steatohepatitis (NASH) certified by the Brazilian National Council of Scientific and Technologic Development (CNPq). Her primary interests include hepatology and gastroenterology, particularly steatosis, and steatohepatitis.
Notes
2 The reader is reminded that the concepts of “risk factors,” as well as “protective factors,” are often noted in the literature, without adequately noting their dimensions (linear, non-linear; rates of development; anchoring or integration, cessation, etc.), their “demands,” the critical necessary conditions (endogenously as well as exogenously; from a micro to a meso to a macro level) which are necessary for either of them to operate (begin, continue, become anchored and integrate, change as de facto realities change, cease, etc.) or not to and whether their underpinnings are theory-driven, empirically-based, individual and/or systemic stake holder- bound, based upon “principles of faith, doctrinaire positions, “personal truths,” historical observation, precedents, and traditions that accumulate over time, conventional wisdom, perceptual and judgmental constraints, “transient public opinion,” or what. This is necessary to consider and to clarify if these term are not to remain as yet additional shibboleth in a field of many stereotypes, tradition-driven activities, “principles of faith,” and stakeholder objectives. Editor's note.
3 The reader is reminded that the content, potency, and pharmacological actions, etc. of illicit drugs are most often unknown notwithstanding the user's “drug experience” which is an outcome of the interaction between the drug being used, the user and his/her characteristics expectations, etc. (set), and the actual site or setting of use. Zinberg, N. E. (1984). Drug, Set, and Setting: The Basis for Controlled Intoxicant Use. New Haven: Yale University Press. Editor's note.
4 The journal's style utilizes the category substance abuse as a diagnostic category. Substances are used or misused; living organisms are and can be abused. Editor's note.
5 The reader is reminded that each of these groups represent heterogeneity and not homogeneity with regard to a range of known, unknown and unknowable, as well as measurable and unmeasurable factors. Editor's note.
6 The reader is referred to Hills's criteria for causation that was developed in order to help assist researchers and clinicians determine if risk factors were causes of a particular disease or outcomes or merely associated (Hill, 1965). The environment and disease: associations or causation? Proceedings of the Royal Society of Medicine 58: 295–300). Editor's note.
7 With the advent of artificial science and its theoretical underpinnings (chaos, complexity, and uncertainty theories) it is now posited that much of human behavior is complex, dynamic, multidimensional, level/phase structured, nonlinear, law-driven, and bounded (culture, time, place, age, gender, ethnicity, etc.). ”Doping,” in which the effects of pharmacological agents, singly or in interactions with other active agents, would be such a process. There are two important issues to consider and which are derived from this: (1) Using linear models/tools to study nonlinear processes/phenomena can and does result in misleading conclusions and can therefore also result in inappropriate intervention; (2) the concepts prediction and control have different meanings and dimensions than they do in the more traditional linear "cause and effect" paradigms. (Buscema, 1998), Artificial Neural Networks, Substance Use & Misuse, 33(1–3). Editor's note.
