Medical doping in sports

Doping today is more common than ever before. For all those looking for performance-enhancing drugs, the options are plenty today. Finding a prescription or non prescription depending on the type of result expected is fairly easy. Problem is that in some cases use of such substances could lead to health problems, thus it is important to research heavily before starting to use anything. Most of the issues are mainly caused due to the athletes and bodybuilders being misled by fake substance sellers. It would be much better if the drugs are obtained with a suitable prescription. On other hand this only works if the medication is available in your country, some of decent substances are not available in all countries.  There are plenty of possibilities of the drugs that are not legally accepted in each country yet.

Some of the banned drugs that are still being used

Meldonium and Actovegin are some of the common drugs used by athletes. Meldonium was originally formulated as a drug to cure coronary artery disease. It is a licensed drug in the pharmaceutical industry in some countries. But in the year 2016, this drug was banned by the World Anti-Doping Agency, for use by athletes, especially during sports events. Athletes were found using this drug to improve their performance and to shoot their energy levels up. Some cited that the drug help protect the body from stress in sports and in other fields of life.

Actovegin is another drug that has a similar function as Meldonium. Both these drugs improve the flow of oxygen in the body, to the cells and they also regulate metabolism. For the Sydney Olympic Games held in the year 2000, the International Olympics Committee had banned Actovegin from being used as an ergogenic the ban was lifted a few months later. And later several other anti-doping committees found that there was no concrete evidence to support the ban of this and some of them even approved this drug. In year 2019 Actovegin will remain safe and legal substance to use as performance enhancer.

Phenotropil or Phenylpiracetam was a drug used to treat various problems with the brain. This was also used as a drug to tackle stress and its impacts on the body. Use of this drug to improve the endurance is one way that sports people began tapping into this drug. The boost in stamina observed in people taking Phenotropil is one reason this one has been identified as a stimulant in sports and banned in some places. This stimulant has been taken off production in year 2018 because of legal fights within between manufacturers in Russia, it most likely will remain very hard to find in year 2019.

So is doping really a big deal?

One of the issues is when athletes are taking substances when they are not aware that they are banned. A good idea would be to keep checking the updated list of the banned drugs by WADA. There have been several cases where sports people have been in severe trouble for taking banned drugs. As prescription medicines or the licensed variants of these banned drugs are available taking them would be a safer option for the sports people. And if you look at the permitted drugs which have not been banned, most of them are safe to use within the prescribed limits as already mentioned Actovegin.

The need for prescription medicines

One of the main reasons for doping is the use of these drugs for pain management and endurance building. But there are prescription drugs that perform similar functions. A physician with the exposure to sports medicines will be able to better analyze the physiological needs of the player and recommend drugs that help tackle the pain, provide quicker recovery and also build stamina. Using prescription drugs has another major advantage- it reduces the chances of drug abuse. There are various drugs that are known to be habit-forming. When a physician prescribes something, the right dosages, warning signs to look for and the maximum allowed levels of consumption are all clarified.