Intravenous Therapy Use in Elite European Adult Track and Field Athletes

Submitting Author/Presenter: Artemii Lazarev, MD Georgiy Malyakin, MD, Ryland Morgans, PhD, Elizaveta Kapralova, MD, Evgeny Achkasov, MD, and Eduard Bezuglov, MD

Affiliation: Mount Sinai Hospital, Chicago, IL

Purpose: to evaluate the incidence of intravenous therapy and to identify the most commonly used pharmacological substances among elite European endurance athletes.

Methods and Study Design: This cross-sectional study included 153 elite track and field athletes (age 22.7 ± 4.6, 94 males, 59 females), who completed an anonymous survey created on Google Forms. The athletes were divided into 3 groups: national (n = 80), international (n = 61), and extra (n = 12, medalists in the major international competitions) tiers.

Results: Fifty-seven percent (n= 84) of respondents confirmed the use of intravenous pharmaceutical substances not prohibited by the World Anti-Doping Agency to enhance performance and optimize post- load recovery. 17.7% (n = 26) of the athletes used them regularly in training process and 39.5% (n = 58) only in preparation before major competitions. No statistically significant difference was found in the frequency of intravenous therapy practice between sexes (P = 0.14) and tiers (P = 0.35). The most commonly used substances were actovegin (46.4%), phosphocreatine (41.8%), amino acids (35.9%), reamberine (35.3%) and hepatoprotectants such as essentiale (35.9%) and heptral (28.7%).

Conclusions: The use of intravenous therapy among elite European track and field athletes is considerably high. Actovegin is the most commonly used substance. Most often, IV therapy is used in preparation before major competitions.

Significance: intravenous administration of the most commonly used substances can be performed without violating anti-doping rules. However, the possible risk of complications and the lack of evidence must be taken into account.