Science / Medicine : Researchers Say Steroids May Be Highly Addictive

Anabolic steroids used by athletes, body builders and teen-agers to pump up their muscles and improve their performance may be highly addictive, researchers warned last week.

Two Yale University researchers reviewed the scientific literature on anabolic steroids and concluded the users could be as seriously hooked as addicts using cocaine.

“We conclude that a proportion of anabolic steroid abusers may develop a previously unrecognized sex steroid hormone dependence disorder,” the researchers said in an article in the Journal of the American Medical Assn.

“Ominously, there are now reports of anabolic steroid hormone use over longer periods of time than was desired, with attempts to stop use that have failed,” wrote Drs. Kenneth Kashkin and Herbert Kleber.

As many as 1 million Americans--including perhaps 250,000 high school students--spend as much as $100 million a year to illegally purchase anabolic steroids, which mimic the male hormone testosterone.

Based on the findings, the researchers recommended more research be done to better understand the addictive qualities of anabolic steroids.

“If the hypothesis is confirmed, we must add the complications of substance dependence to the known risk of high-dose sex steroids,” they said, adding that users should be “treated rather than tested and penalized.”