German steroid

by Michael Mooney (from Issue No. 3, May 1996)

A new study shows that one of the most powerful oral anabolic steroids improves lean muscle mass with no significant side-effects in HIV-positive men and women. (1) Oxymetholone, formerly sold in the US as Anadrol-50, was given for thirty weeks at a 150 mg/daily dose.

Weight gain averaged 14.5% of bodyweight, which is significant because there was no exercise program instituted, but it is known that anabolic steroids exert their greatest effect when weightlifting is employed. Notably, even the subset of patients burdened with AIDS-related infections continued to gain weight on oxymetholone.

While oxymetholone is considered to be a harsh steroid with a high potential for side-effects, the subjects were reported to have no significant problems with liver function, water retention, virilization, and several side-effects thought to be associated with its use, at a dose that is three times what many bodybuilders would use, for considerably longer than they would generally use it.

The study didn’t look at CD8+ T cell counts, which appear to be more correlative with survival than CD4+ T cells,(2) which were not correlative with weight gain in this study.

1. Oxymetholone promotes weight gain in patients with advanced human immunodeficienty virus (HIV-1) infection. Hengge, et al. Brit J Nutri (1996) 75:129-138]
2. CD8+ lymphocyte counts and the risk of death in advanced HIV infection. Schlumpberger JM, et al. J Family Practice (1994) 38(1):33-38.