Performance Enhancing Drugs In Sports Research Paper

Improved Essays
Performance enhancing drugs in sports present a very real problem. Recently, sports media covered the story of the University of Florida quarterback, Will Grier. He was suspended an entire calendar year from NCAA football for testing positive for performance enhancing drugs (Aschoff 1). Performance enhancing drugs are often a subject that is surrounded by questions that no one ever answers outside of the leagues in which these substances are banned (i.e. NCAA, NFL, NHL, MLB, NBA, etc). This means that most people that are not involved in these leagues are not very educated. This is illustrated in the Journal of Sports Science & Medicine by author Levent Özdemir. He is quoted as saying, “[s]ince the potential side effects of doping drugs are …show more content…
Additionally, other questions are raised about the ethical side of the use of performance enhancing drugs in sports. Do these drugs translate to better stats and an improved chance for that player’s team to win? The answer is, almost always, yes. As it seems with the changing culture of sports, no one is exempt from accusations of misconduct. This leads someone to question, if he can perform at such a high level, then are there really side effects? The answer is, once again, yes. There are very serious, possibly life-threatening, side effects of using performance enhancing drugs. Performance enhancing drugs present a very relevant, real threat not only to the player, but to the sport …show more content…
The sports governing bodies (i.e. NCAA, NFL, NHL, MLB, NBA, etc) are very concerned with player health. For this reason, among others, they have banned performance enhancing drugs. To quote Dag Vidar Hanstad, Perspectives in Public Health, the author states in the article “Sport, health and drugs: a critical re-examination of some key issues and problems” that “the best-documented effects are those on the liver, serum lipids [,] and the reproductive system” (Hanstad 178). This same journal goes on to say that “[o]ther areas of concern are personality changes and behavioral changes, coronary artery disease, cerebrovascular accidents, prostatic changes [,] and the immune functions” (Hanstad 178). As this medical journal clearly states that the athletes simply are not the same post-performance enhancing drugs. The toll that these drugs take on the user 's body is oftentimes irreversible. In concurrence to the first medical journal the Endocrine Reviews, also confirms these side effects to taking performance enhancing drugs. The drugs that were tested in the Endocrine Reviews are: anabolic steroids, androstenedione, human growth hormone (HGH), erythropoietin, diuretics, creatine, or other stimulants. The Endocrine Reviews states that some of the adverse side effects (just to name a few) are cardiovascular effects, psychiatric effects, and violent behaviors (Pope Jr., Wood, Rogol, Nyberg, Bowers

Related Documents

  • Great Essays

    Barry Bonds Research Paper

    • 1759 Words
    • 8 Pages

    Performance enhancing drugs can help an athlete’s performance, but there is long term effect on the athlete’s body. Therefore, World Anti-Doping Agency and other organizations must do a better job to help athletes understand the risk of using PED. Background The Olympics began testing athletes for the use of performance enhancing drugs around 1968, the National Football League began in 1987, and the Major League Baseball began in 2003. The use of PEDs was not a crime until 1988, when Congress passed the Anti-Drug Abuse Act.…

    • 1759 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Over the years, Player Enhancing Drugs have become very popular for many athletes. The risk is high for a higher return. Although there are many other ways to enhance performance, some athletes still tend to lend on these “drugs”. The history of Performance Enhancing Drugs (PED’s) date back to the ancient Greek times (“Drugs and Athletes” Gale).…

    • 568 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Ethical Dilemmas The use of performance enhancing drugs has been an issue for our society as early as the 1960’s. Performance enhancing drugs are used to gain an advantage over one’s competitors. The National Football League and National League Baseball were some of the first major organization to start testing their players for steroids (Performance Enhancing Drugs, 2016). These drugs are so widely banned and morally frowned upon; the athletes who still chose to use them do so in secret.…

    • 1013 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Additionally, long-term abuse of anabolic steroids increases the risk of serious conditions such as heart attack, stroke, and cancer” (Lew). This conveys that steroids are awful for the body and cause serious problems to the human body. Majority of the players do not think of the long term effects of steroids, but only at the short term such as their abilities increasing. Former players have said that once they stopped using steroids, they began to have suicidal thoughts. There have also been past players who have actually committed suicide.…

    • 1638 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Kayer, Mauron and Miah (2005) take the legalization side of the debate. They claim that biological and environmental factors do not match up. Some athletes are at an unfair advantage due to their genetic makeup over others. Mayer et al. also argue that sports themselves are dangerous towards athletes health.…

    • 892 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Using Steroids In Sports

    • 994 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Cancers, and tumors are another series thing that steroid use can cause. Some side effects of steroids are rage, mania, and delusions. While some players are risking the use of steroids on the field that person is also putting their future health in jeopardy. Steroids affect the health of the individual and can create many problems in the long-run for that person as well as ruin the sports…

    • 994 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Growth can be stunted at a young age. Steroids can damage veins If you are an athlete taking steroids, you can be suspended from games and even be expelled from the league Effects can even lead to death, many major and long term problems include. Balding and hair los.s Aggression and Depression. You can get paranoid and end up with insomnia .Vomiting High Blood Pressure Aching Joints Liver Damage.…

    • 1010 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Heart disease, liver tumors, violent aggressive behavior, mood swings. Do having these risks of Performance Enhancing Drugs (PEDs) sound like a fun life to have? People like Lance Armstrong and Jodie Meeks use PEDs even after knowing these health risks and get caught every day. Using Performance Enhancing Drugs is harmful to an athlete´s health and can threaten their future success. There are many health risks possible when taking Performance Enhancing Drugs.…

    • 401 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    From an athlete 's perspective they may see performance- enhancing drugs as just another boost to help them stay on top and nothing is wrong with a little “boost” but because of the lack of information provided to the athletes they are misinformed about what drugs they are taking or the technology of the performance-enhancing drugs such as injury prevention that can occur (Verducci). Finding such information such as performance-enhancing drugs could prevent an athlete from injuries is an even more reason for performance-enhancing drugs to be reviewed before banning them. Injury prevention could change the lives of many athletes, saving them from a lifetime of pain and misery because of a major injury an athlete was not able to fully recover…

    • 1171 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Steroid Use In Sports

    • 942 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Using drugs in sports should not be taken lightly. “Wild mood swings, depression, anxiety, paranoia, violence. Decrease in pleasure in everyday life. Complication of mental illness. Hallucinations.…

    • 942 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Drug Testing Athletes “Pharmacological performance-enhancing substances are banned because of their adverse effects on both athletes’ health and competitive integrity” (Mitten, 2008, p.62). “Approximately one percent of the 11,000 National Collegiate Athletic Association student-athletes who randomly are tested each year [as of 2005] come up…

    • 958 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    For hundreds of years in the history of sports, athletes have become stronger, faster, and more skilled in their specific sport. They have done this by pushing themselves to their limits each day to be the greatest of all time. Then came performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs), the killer of sports. PEDs created an unfair playing field and caused many users to receive negative effects not only in the short-term but also in the long-term. Not to mention these drugs can be lethal.…

    • 1573 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Unfortunately these performance enhancing drugs have numerous negative side effects, both physical and psychological. According to the DEA’s office of diversion and control most of the short term side effects are fairly more well know than the long term side effects, many of which are irreversible. A. Major side effects can include liver tumors and cancer, yellowing of the skin, high blood pressure, kidney tumors, severe acne, and trembling. Along with increases in bad cholesterol levels and decreases in good cholesterol levels.…

    • 1171 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Great Essays

    J Savulescu, B Foddy, and M Clayton, all professors in the field of sports medicine, argue in their article “Why we should allow performance enhancing drugs in sport” that the use of performance enhancing drugs is becoming more effective despite the health risks present in these drugs, stating “… despite the health risks, and despite the regulating bodies attempts to eliminate drugs from sport, the use of illegal substances is widely known to be rife” (Savulescu et al. 3). Scholarly professors and sports fan alike tend to be biased when the phrase “performance enhancing drugs” is thrown around and fail to fully analyze the issue. The truth of the matter is that the use of such drugs will harm the athlete, but with certain restrictions these drugs can be safe. Setting limitations to athletes and having medical supervision over these drugs can provide benefits to the sport and end the ongoing issue of the legalization of performance enhancers. Rather than testing for drugs, medical professionals and sports analyst should look more into the issue of health and fitness, putting the strength of individuals to the test, as this is what sports portray.…

    • 2223 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    As we look deep into sports in our society today, we discover there are many aspects to the athletic world that are often hot topics, or controversial issues. One of the biggest, most popular topics in the society of sports is whether performance enhancing drugs should be legalized and used, or banned altogether. In my own opinion, these performance enhancing drugs should not be legalized, or allowed in the world of sports. There are many reasons that the use of performance enhancing drugs should not be allowed in athletics. One of the biggest reasons is to make the game fair for each athlete.…

    • 620 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays