Human Growth Hormone Scams - HGHMarketing "Milestones" The drive to popularize growth hormone began about 20 years ago with publication of the book Life Extension: A Practical Scientific Approach, by Durk Pearson and Sandy Shaw. The book's central premise was large amounts of vitamins, minerals, amino acids, and and other substances would cause people to add muscle, burn fat, and live much longer. Although their advice had no scientific basis, Pearson and Shaw made hundreds of talk-show appearances that boosted sales of the substances they recommended. Soon after the book's publication, many amino acid products were claimed to cause overnight weight loss by increasing the release of growth hormone. So called "growth-hormone releasers" were also marketed to bodybuilders with claims that they would help build muscle. Such claims are unfounded because amino acids taken by mouth do not stimulate growth hormone release. These formulations are based mainly on misinterpreted studies of intravenous arginine, which can increase HGH blood levels for an hour or so. Taking it by mouth has no such effect. The FTC, and the New York City Department of Consumer Affairs attacked some companies making "growth-hormone release" claims, but these actions had very little effect on the overall marketplace. In 1990, The New England Journal of Medicine published a study that attracted mainstream media attention. The study involved 12 men, aged 61 to 81, who were apparently healthy but had IGF-I levels below those found in normal young men. The 12 men were given growth hormone injections three times a week for six months and compared with 9 men who received no treatment. The treatment resulted in a decrease in adipose (fatty) tissue and increases in lean body (muscle) mass and lumbar spine density. An accompanying editorial warned that some of the subjects had experienced side effects and that the long-range effects of administering HGH to healthy adults were unknown. It also warned that the hormone shots were expensive and that the study had not examined whether the men who received the hormone had substantially improved their muscle strength, mobility, or quality of life. Despite the warning, the study inspired many offbeat physicians to market themselves as "anti-aging specialists." Many such physicians offer expensive tests that supposedly determine the patient's "biological age," which they promise to lower with expensive hormone shots and dietary supplements. In 2001, NBC's Dateline showed what happened when a 57-year-old woman visited a Cenegenics clinic in Las Vegas, Nevada, where she underwent $1,500 worth of tests and was offered a hormone and 40-pill-a-day supplement program that would cost $1,500 a month. She was told that although she tested at "age 54,"her hormone levels were "sub-optimal" and that optimal would be the level of a 30-year -old. The 1990 article also helped stimulate formation of the American Association for Anti-Aging Medicine and the unrecognized medical specialty of "anti-aging medicine." The group, founded in 1993. states that it has 11,500 members, of whom 80% are medical or osteopathic physicians. Many exhibitors at its conferences have made questionable claims for HGH-related products. The Internet has added another dimension to the HGH marketplace. Thousands of Web sites and spam e-mailers are hawking the actual hormone; alleged HGH releasers; alleged oral hormone products (which can't work because any HGH would be digested); and/or "homeopathic HGH" products. Caution Needed HGH is useful for treating growth hormone deficiency in children and adults and has several other proven (FDA-approved) uses. But the the American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists has warned that the clinical use of growth hormone as an anti-aging treatment or for patients with ordinary obesity is not recommended. Robert N. Butler, M.D., the noted gerontologist who founded and heads the International Longevity Center-USA has warned that, "So-called anti-aging medicine is largely a sham. We simply do not have the equivalent of a blood pressure cuff for testing aging." He further states: Although growth hormone levels decline with age, it has not been proven that trying to maintain the levels that exist in young persons is beneficial. It is conceivable that age-related hormonal changes may serve as useful markers of physiological aging. However, this has not been demonstrated experimentally for either humans or animals. Although hormone-replacement trials have yielded some positive results (at least in the short term), it is clear that negative side effects can also occur in the form of increased risk for cancer, cardiovascular disease, and behavior changes. It might even turn out that lower growth-hormone levels are an indicator of health. Research findings indicate that mice that overproduce growth hormones live only a short time, suggesting that growth-hormone deficiency itself does not cause accelerated aging, but that the opposite may be true. Doctors who claim to have the ability to measure "biomarkers of aging" and favorably affect them are not scientifically-based. In March 2003, the New England Journal of Medicine's took the unprecedented step of denouncing misuse of Rudman's 1990 article. The full text of the article was placed online so readers could see for themselves what it actually said; and editorials pointed out that subsequent reports provide no reason to be optimistic. As noted by Editor-in-Chief Jeffrey M. Drazen, M.D. Although the findings of the study were biologically interesting, the duration of treatment was so short that side effects were unlikely to have emerged, and it was clear that the results were not sufficient to serve as a basis for treatment recommendations. Indeed, Mary Lee Vance of the University of Virginia said in an accompanying editorial, "Because there are so many unanswered questions about the use of growth hormone in the elderly and in adults with growth hormone deficiency, its general use now or in the immediate future is not justified." Dr. Vance restates her views on the study in this issue of the Journal; they remain fundamentally unchanged. We are especially concerned because the promotional e-mails are apparently sending readers to our Web site; the 1990 article by Rudman et al. receives as many "hits" in a week as other 1990 articles do in a year. If people are induced to buy a "human growth hormone releaser" on the basis of research published in the Journal, they are being misled. In order to warn those who visit our Web site for this reason, this Perspective article and Dr. Vance's commentaries will from now on appear with the article by Rudman et al. each time it is downloaded. |
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