AAS Used Therapeutically

I think if you do a simple google search you can find plenty of information of side effects/long term effects of steroids. It isn’t something I just “know”, it is something most everyone “knows”.

As for other uses, in some circumstances, I think AAS have legit uses. There is a reason why your body does what it does. Sometimes it is good, sometimes, not so much. You should never assume anything. It often seems like something is a good idea, and when you go and study it, things don’t turn out the way you thought they would. I know from experience that most people will choose to see things in the way they want to.

Just curious, since maybe we are talking about apples and oranges. What situations do you think AAS are appropriate for therapeutic use? Which doses? Which drugs? For how long?

[quote]teratos wrote:
buffd_samurai wrote:

I’m 41. I bet I won’t drop dead at 45 from complications of steroid use. Your last paragraph is the same old medical community arguments used against the juice. “Lots of side effects…lots of long term ill-effects…”…all old hat thinking.

However, in supraphysiologic doses this is true. If you don’t want to use doses which are supra-physiologic, you would be happy with androderm, or test enthanate 100mg every 2 weeks.[/quote]

Yes, my 2nd paragraph in my original response indicated as such. No argument whatsoever with respect to supraphysiologic doses.

[quote]
buffd_samurai wrote:
The use of therapeutic dosages for short periods of time do indeed have a use in our world today; especially for us weightlifters, bodybuilders, and powerlifters. In my case I have tried it, monitored it, and will continue to use it whenever I’m in particularly abnormal stress situations as I mentioned in the original post.

You could. Here’s the problem. Then endocrine system is pretty smart. It shuts down it’s own hormone production once it determines there is enough of it in the system. You start taking exogenous test, your endogenous test production goes down…pretty quickly. What’s the point, unless you go supraphysiologic…that’s where you get the “good” effects.[/quote]

Bushy did a pretty good job of answering how I would have answered. To add to this however: exogenous test and endogenous test are the same to the endocrine system. In my opinion, as long as you don’t “fill the well” above the brim, the feedback system won’t shutdown.

My point of this discussion is to indicate that supraphysiologic levels are not needed for general beneficial uses. In particular, I’m focusing on those times of excessive stress.

[quote]
buffd_samurai wrote:
By the way, I mentioned my experiment and my slight issue with blood lipid values. Blood lipid levels went down to normal basal values if I stayed off of the regimen for at least 2 weeks. As with all of my results, this is how it works for me. Others may experience different results.

Yeah, I would expect that. If you are in your 40’s and not using AAS in high-dose cycles for months or years, you won’t get premature coronary disease. As for you lipids, the effects of elevated lipids are cumulative. Let’s say you are on AAS 6 mos of the year with an everage total cholsterol of 300 with bad HDL to LDL ratios. The other 6 mos, you have good cholesterol…say 210 with good ratios. You are still doing damage to your vessels. [/quote]

I agree. This is why I define (for myself) therapeutic use to be use only for specific times; not continuous. I also wanted to see for myself what effects even low dosages have on me. NOTE: I did not use testosterone; I used D-bol, an oral steroid that is 17-AA. I knew going in that these type of orals do bad things to your lipids. I don’t think there is as much a problem with testosterone (but I may be wrong). Also, I am not completely sold on the relationship of cholesterol to coronary disease. I think there is something, but I think other factors might play into the situation more.

Amen.
Teratos, I very much appreciate your candor in this conversation. I have similiar conversations with other physicians (some of my older aged gym buddies) on this topic and the debate continues.
I can appreciate your words regarding controlled substances and its impact to your practice.
I can also appreciate the fact that some patients don’t listen to the facts or pay attention with what is actually going on. Indeed, this is where the danger to oneself with AAS use raises its ugly head.
There are many though, like me, who DO listen to our bodies. We DO get the bloodwork done and try to intelligently interpret them (like I mentioned, I’m really really really lucky. Some of my geezer friends are physicians themselves)and make the appropriate adjustments if necessary.
Trying to protect the overabusing population from itself shouldn’t govern the way of life for the rest of us. My opinion.

[quote]teratos wrote:
I think if you do a simple google search you can find plenty of information of side effects/long term effects of steroids. It isn’t something I just “know”, it is something most everyone “knows”.

As for other uses, in some circumstances, I think AAS have legit uses. There is a reason why your body does what it does. Sometimes it is good, sometimes, not so much. You should never assume anything. It often seems like something is a good idea, and when you go and study it, things don’t turn out the way you thought they would. I know from experience that most people will choose to see things in the way they want to.

Just curious, since maybe we are talking about apples and oranges. What situations do you think AAS are appropriate for therapeutic use? Which doses? Which drugs? For how long?[/quote]

I think my humble opinion was already stated at the very beginning of this post: therapeutic use to get over the stress hump.

I think Dbol, testosterone prop., oxandrolone, primobolan, Tbol, etc are all reasonable choices as long as they are used in low dosages and very infrequently.

Dosages can only be determined through an intelligent trial and error period that includes bloodwork monitoring. Though the system changes as one ages, this initial “dialing in period” is a good gage of what dosages one should use in future therapeutic applications.

In my case, I started with 25 mg of Dbol on Saturday and on Sunday. I eventually wittled that down to 15 mg a day on the weekends based upon my bloodwork. I also paid attention to how I “felt” (I know, subjective)and my general training performance throughout the experiment.

At least for me, this type of “therapeutic” use has “bridged” me over some pretty stressful times without sacrificing the hard earned lean tissue and associated strength.

here’s a little input of my own experiment.

i was deployed, i began loseing weight at a very rapid and unhealthy pace.i increased my caloric load to appx. 6500 cals per day but could not stop the loss.granted the food hear is not the most nutritious to begin with(think prison food), so i supplemented with some of biotests best.

my day was entirely too aerobic for me to maintain. so i changed the philosphy, i decided to sythisis my nutrients in a better way.

i began a tbol cycle that most would scoff at.
20mg eod & eow. (example)
mon-wed-fri, 20mg
tues-thur-sat-sun, off
following week off
start over

i almost immidiatly began to recover lost weight. i was able to maintain on a 4500 calorie diet and have even seen a small increase over the last couple of months.

therapy from aas can be good.

[quote]50x wrote:
here’s a little input of my own experiment.

i was deployed, i began loseing weight at a very rapid and unhealthy pace.i increased my caloric load to appx. 6500 cals per day but could not stop the loss.granted the food hear is not the most nutritious to begin with(think prison food), so i supplemented with some of biotests best.

my day was entirely too aerobic for me to maintain. so i changed the philosphy, i decided to sythisis my nutrients in a better way.

i began a tbol cycle that most would scoff at.
20mg eod & eow. (example)
mon-wed-fri, 20mg
tues-thur-sat-sun, off
following week off
start over

i almost immidiatly began to recover lost weight. i was able to maintain on a 4500 calorie diet and have even seen a small increase over the last couple of months.

therapy from aas can be good.
[/quote]

50x, thankyou very much for posting your experience.

50x’s usage is EXACTLY what I call beneficial use of AAS. Couldn’t have thought of a more excellent scenario for AAS therapeutic usage.

[quote]bushidobadboy wrote:
If there is anyone reading this thread who thinks that the benefits this guy experienced are somehow outweighed by the risk he took (ie that he did a foolish and unnecessary thing), then PLEASE chip in, I’d love to hear your point of view (serious).[/quote]

If there IS anybody who thinks that the low dose tbol cycle described by this guy was risky, in my opinion they would be a complete fuckwit. But, chip in anyway…

I agree with many of the points made in this thread. I think, especially as we age, test supplementation is very useful, and beneficial. I will likely do some test supplementation myself in not so many years. Growth Hormone looks promising as well, in many respect better than test. I think using them to get over some “humps” is useful. My concern is that what people consider a “hump” isn’t really a call to use AAS. I believe they are underutilized by physicians, mostly because of the laws. The DEA keeps track of how many schedule 2 drugs you write, and if you go outside the norms, you get audited. I probably write more testosterone than many docs, but I also ask the appropriate questions, do the appropriate bloodwork, and write for appropriate doses.

There are a lot of younger guys out there who come and look for AAS. They think because I lift I am more likely to give them out. Wrong. What some may define as a “hump”, I don’t think warrants AAS. You have to be careful. These are potent and danagerous drugs. For those who have used them sparingly and with good results, I appreciate your input. There aren’t any good medical studies that I have seen, and even your anecdotal experience is interesting to me.

[quote]teratos wrote:
I agree with many of the points made in this thread. I think, especially as we age, test supplementation is very useful, and beneficial. I will likely do some test supplementation myself in not so many years. Growth Hormone looks promising as well, in many respect better than test. I think using them to get over some “humps” is useful. My concern is that what people consider a “hump” isn’t really a call to use AAS. I believe they are underutilized by physicians, mostly because of the laws. The DEA keeps track of how many schedule 2 drugs you write, and if you go outside the norms, you get audited. I probably write more testosterone than many docs, but I also ask the appropriate questions, do the appropriate bloodwork, and write for appropriate doses. [/quote]

I’m on your side here doc. Really, I wish more physicians are like you and my gym buddies: open-minded and adaptive.

A “hump” really is in the eye of the beholder, isn’t it? This is why I stated what I considered a “hump” via the examples presented in the original post.

[quote]
There are a lot of younger guys out there who come and look for AAS. They think because I lift I am more likely to give them out. Wrong. What some may define as a “hump”, I don’t think warrants AAS. You have to be careful. These are potent and danagerous drugs. For those who have used them sparingly and with good results, I appreciate your input. There aren’t any good medical studies that I have seen, and even your anecdotal experience is interesting to me. [/quote]

These are definitely potent drugs, and can be dangerous…however this is true of most any drug. If we keep that in perspective, then AAS are no more dangerous than other prescribed medication if used properly. As you said, (and as Bushy mentions), there are not alot of good medical studies out there. But there are alot of feedback out there, especially on forums like this that present a wealth of anecdotal experiences that one can ponder on.

Enjoyed the discussion all. And thankyou Doctor Teratos.

I would just like to add to the conversation, from my research applied to testosterone tapering, that it was found that 25mg of test E, administered weekly had absolutely no effect on gonadotrophin. So you could according to research increase your blood testosterone levels, quite nicely without causing any suppression whatsoever. This could be the difference between someone having testosterone levels in the midrange to having high normal levels of T.

And of course no impact on health/ lipid profiles e.t.c. were found using such a small dose.

I think the greatest potential for therapeutic use of AAS (and one that would be accepted by the public if it could show strong results due to the large number of candidates) is probably to help combat the problem of our lazy, overweight, and weak population.

There are already so many high risks associated with being overweight that the side effects of low dose AAS would be minimal in comparison if it led to a strong change in body comp. They would have to also practice good diet and excercise to get there but the AAS would be a pretty effective motivator.

I know that good diet and excercise would get them there on their own but middle america doesn’t want good diet and excercise alone. They want an edge.

I also know that AAS don’t burn fat but the reason they are that way in the first place is that they are lazy, have little muscle mass, and slow metabolisms. Maybe a little test is what they need to break them out of that slump. To give them that edge.

I am reading about these protocols for low dose use and can’t help but think of all the weight loss drugs on the market that give questionable results or have serious side effects (and some we don’t know about until someone/many people drop(s) dead). Would we be better off with anabolics?

We know that AAS are effective and we know the side effects pretty well (and how to mitigate them). If you could come up with a means of controlling the dosing and regulating the use of AAS, AIs, PCT, etc you could come up with a safe way that John Q. Fatso could get on the fast tract to health.

What if it was a low dose of Test-E as suggested by P22 that simply got them from the low range of t to a mid-high range without screwing up their endogenous levels?

Does a problem lie in the fact that they are effective and therefore addictive and dangerous? maybe but is it worth the risk due to the high risk of being overweight in the first place?