# STEROIDS FORUM > IGF-1 LR3, HGH, and INSULIN QUESTIONS >  Best time to take HGH?

## SoSwole

What is the best time to take HGH? My buddy is starting today. Thanks!

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## wallycn

I take mine first thing in the morning with 12.5mcgs of t3, shot of insulin after my workout, then another shot of gh with 12.5mcgs of t3 in the evening(usually around 6 or 7)

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## LL08

This is not an easy question to answer. 

There are two man stands on this. One group claims that rHGH will shut down your natural gh production. Another group argues that rHGH will not shut your natural gh production if taken at the right time.

The first group who think the GH shuts you down will take the gh first thing before going to bed as this is when the pituatary gland releases the most gh naturally. So assuming that natural gh release is shut down it would make sense to simulate this by taking the gh first thing at night. 

The second group would take the gh first thing in the morning in the hope that it would not disturb your natural gh release. 

Both have merit. Although if natural gh does get shut down then it would be best to take it at night as gh is naturally released during sleep for specific reasons. IMO the safest way to do it would be I.M for the first month in the morning then move to a morning IM and a sub-q shot in the PM. I hope this helps.

-LL

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## alwayson

why IM?

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## Nicky B

> What is the best time to take HGH? My buddy is starting today. Thanks!


How many iu's is your buddy taking because that affects the way he takes it.

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## LL08

> why IM?


I am by no means an expert but trying..i'm just researching through Pubmed. and other similar journal sources so I hope this helps...taking hgh by I.M gives you a lesser peak but the hgh level is more sustained for longer whereas sub-q has a higher peak and stays for a shorter amount of time.

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## wallycn

> I am by no means an expert but trying..i'm just researching through Pubmed. and other similar journal sources so I hope this helps...taking hgh by I.M gives you a lesser peak but the hgh level is more sustained for longer whereas sub-q has a higher peak and stays for a shorter amount of time.


I still thought sub-q was the way to go with hgh, I shoot my slin IM so it will work quicker and be out of my system faster. Am I thinking backwards????

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## wallycn

> I still thought sub-q was the way to go with hgh, I shoot my slin IM so it will work quicker and be out of my system faster. Am I thinking backwards????


bump..anyone wanna chime in?

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## SoSwole

He is running 4IU's a day.

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## Property of Steroid.com

Well...first of all, HGH is more effective when you shoot it Every other Day, instead of every day...so....thats my advice....time of day may not matter, but shooting EOD is far superior to ED.

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## MMA

> Well...first of all, HGH is more effective when you shoot it Every other Day, instead of every day...so....thats my advice....time of day may not matter, but shooting EOD is far superior to ED.


thats new info to me. what is the new modern dosing schedule and why? also, what board has the best GH forum? redbaron once gave me a link to an amazing GH forum, but i forgot what it was.

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## wallycn

> Well...first of all, HGH is more effective when you shoot it Every other Day, instead of every day...so....thats my advice....time of day may not matter, but shooting EOD is far superior to ED.


why is that??????

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## j.r.w.

> Well...first of all, HGH is more effective when you shoot it Every other Day, instead of every day...so....thats my advice....time of day may not matter, but shooting EOD is far superior to ED.



I would like to know why you say EOD. New news to me as well. Where did you get your info? Not trying to contradict you, just researching.

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## MMA

found an analysis of the study, and a link to it.

EOD GH injections are better!..... study says

A very thorough well controlled 4 year study published on
The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism Vol. 87, No.8 3573-3577
clearly shows every other day (EOD) hGH injections to be much more beneficial in the long run to everyday injections. Everyday injections seems to drastically lower your body's sensitivity to it's own GH secretion. The study included children with idiopathic short stature, but can be ever casting on us, normal non-deficient hGH individuals who may use hGH periodically for bodybuilding, sports and health purposes.

The 38 children were divided into 2 groups:
Group I received daily hGH injections.
Group II received alternate day hGH injections.

It is important to note that the total weekly dosage of hGH was the same for both groups.

Both groups received the hGH therapy contiguously for 2 years.
Their natural growth was followed for an additional 2 years after hGH therapy ended. They were all measured at 3-month intervals during the 4 years period (2 years with hGH therapy and 2 years after). Their Serum GH was measured by double antibody RIA kit.

During hGH therapy, both groups accelerated their growth substantially.
Group I receiving the daily hGH injections first & second year velocity was 3.4 and 2.3 SD Group II receiving the alternate hGH inj. had 3.0 and 2.0 SD for first and second year respectively.

Over the initial 6 months after withdrawal of therapy, growth velocity decelerated to a low nadir -3.9 SD score for the daily therapy group, whereas it decelerated in the alternate day group to only -0.2 SD score.

During the 2 years off therapy, the later group (taking EOD injections)
maintained growth rates of -0.2 to -1.2 SD score, which is similar to their SD score prior to the hGH treatment. The daily group also recovered but very slowly, on the fourth semiannual evaluation off therapy. The cumulative 4-year growth velocity (2yrs on and 2 yrs off therapy) of the alternate day group was greater than that of the daily therapy group (mean, 0.9 vs. 0.3 SD score).

At the end of the 4-yr therapy period, the adult height prediction of the alternate day group was greater than that of the daily group by a mea of 6.5cm (that's over 2.5" in height, quite a lot of difference)

In even simpler English, to translate what it may mean to us is that using hGH everyday will only negligibly give better short-term results. Yet using alternate day hGH will give radically better long-term results and much better recovery. As the body may get back to homeostasis much faster.

Remember the two groups got the same weekly total hGH dosage,
so your every other day hGH injections would be twice as if you used
it every day.

The researchers said, the dose was of less impotency than the schedule of the injections. Daily hGH therapy for 3 years caused subnormal growth persisting for 1.5 years (very bad)

It may be that the problem is not enough hGH or IGF-1 secretion but rather
the body's decreased sensitivity to it. The interesting part is that the serum GH levels and serum IGF-I and IGF-binding protein remained unaffected or relatively mutely affected. Even your body's endogenous pulsatile secretion of GH resumes within just days even after long-term hGH therapy.

The researchers hypothesis is that the tolerance may be in the "GH signal transduction in selective target organs in response to the disappearance of the unique pulsatile pattern of serum GH during GH therapy". You see, hGH taken via sc injections do not imitate the your body's own GH secretion.
"Indeed, daily sc administration of GH results in an unphysiological serum GH profile, with peak levels at 4 h and a slow decline over the course of the following 1224 h. This pattern can be regarded as continuous administration, rather than the physiological GH pulses, with a frequency of about eight per day."

"Assuming that the withdrawal syndrome is related to tolerance that might have developed toward hGH or IGF-I, we tried to prevent it by alternate day treatment. Moreover, hGH doses used in therapy often stimulate IGF-I to supraphysiological serum levels, suggesting that target tissues IGF-I may also be higher than normal. The mechanism seems, therefore, to rest with hGH and IGF-I action at their target tissues. We now show that alternate day therapy
with hGH in children with an intact GH-IGF-I axis prevents the withdrawal syndrome"

Researchers mark the analogy to another endocrine tolerance and withdrawal syndrome:
"alternate day therapy with glucocoricoids prevents tolerance to that hormone to a substantial degree, "Interestingly, glucocoricoids withdrawal syndrome can also occur while the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis is intact (8), indicating that tolerance to glucocoricoids has developed
at the target organ level (9). "

An example of a good safe protocol to follow in my opinion could be

hGH taken for 4 months (16 weeks) or more at 8IU every other day,
split to 4IU three hours after waking up (say 11:00am)
and another 4IU taken 4 hours later (say 3:00pm).
This approach is quite conservative and may be optimal.

Obviously, you may extend past 4months, and take more IUs per day.
This approach goes with 8IU EOD, so it is equivalent to folks that would
otherwise go with 4IU ED, which is what most do.

There is some controversy as to how many of these IUs the body
can utilize at once

Obviously, there are lot of studies, some better conducted, some less.
Lots of opinions and doctrines in endocrinology, bodybuilding etc..
So you should make your own decision, I guess old individuals on
hGH for life would not mind, as no rebound would affect them. Professional
bodybuilders probably wouldn't mind as well.

I would rather follow a protocol like this. For most part due to the
nasty rebound that I could get after withdrawing from long-term ED hGH treatment.
Nothing worse then look awesome, stop hGH then after several months having:
Low body sensitivity to your own body's GH.
Slow recovery
Decline in resting cardiac output
Increase fat mass
Decrease in metabolic rate
Negative nitrogen balance, phosphorus, sodium and potassium.

Again, I said "could" not "would", because this study cannot absolutely manifest
our use of hGH. Moreso, we are not children, we are not idiopathic hGH deficient
and not aGHD. But since the weekly dosages do remain the same as well as the
duration of the hGH usage. Just changing to the EOD protocol from the well
hyped everyday inj protocol is worth in my honest opinion. It seems statistically
a better bet, with more chance to win, than loose as opposed to the ED protocol.

I just tried to summarize the findings of the study, which was by the way,
a pleasure to read as the study is well written and was prepared by
Dr Hochberg, MD, a renowned well respected figure in endocrinology.

You can read the full article with all the graphs and details here:
http://jcem.endojournals.org/cgi/content/full/87/8/3573
With references to 23 studies.

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## spound

> Well...first of all, HGH is more effective when you shoot it Every other Day, instead of every day...so....thats my advice....time of day may not matter, but shooting EOD is far superior to ED.


If this is true, then I can actually afford GH!!! It would be great news. I hope this is true, I read the study, but why has everyone always said ED is better?

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## MMA

...and i think people are completely misreading this study




> Group I receiving the daily hGH injections first & second year velocity was 3.4 and 2.3 SD Group II receiving the alternate hGH inj. had 3.0 and 2.0 SD for first and second year respectively.


daily injections clearly had a stronger effect than EOD. the drop off came AFTER they stopped dosing. the other group was doing DAILY injections, not the standard 5-2 we use. not surprisingly, they either ruined their endogenous GH production or became insensitive to it. i would rather be on GH 10 days out of 14, than be on 7 days out of 14. 5 on 2 off also has a proven safety record, there is no need to go all the way down to 1 on, 1 off.

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## MMA

> If this is true, then I can actually afford GH!!! It would be great news. I hope this is true, I read the study, but why has everyone always said ED is better?


they said ED was better because it is better, as the study clearly shows. also, if you read the study, the exact same total amounts were used in ED and EOD methods, meaning that absolutely no money would be saved.

don't give up hope tho. if you can only afford half the GH you need, just do a lower dose cycle. people have had very positive effects with very low doses over a log period of time. run 3 iu/day instead of 6 iu/day, and this will achieve what you're looking for.

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## Fit2bLarge

i shoot gh PWO with slin in the PM. about 3 hours before bed. i get less joint pain on this schedule.

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## MMA

> This is not an easy question to answer. 
> 
> There are two man stands on this. One group claims that rHGH will shut down your natural gh production. Another group argues that rHGH will not shut your natural gh production if taken at the right time.
> 
> The first group who think the GH shuts you down will take the gh first thing before going to bed as this is when the pituatary gland releases the most gh naturally. So assuming that natural gh release is shut down it would make sense to simulate this by taking the gh first thing at night. 
> 
> The second group would take the gh first thing in the morning in the hope that it would not disturb your natural gh release. 
> 
> Both have merit. Although if natural gh does get shut down then it would be best to take it at night as gh is naturally released during sleep for specific reasons. IMO the safest way to do it would be I.M for the first month in the morning then move to a morning IM and a sub-q shot in the PM. I hope this helps.
> ...


i would have posted the upsides and downsides of that program, but LL already did

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## LL08

MMA is spot on. ED is better and by doing 5 days on 2 days off you minimise the risk of shutting down your endogenous hgh release. What I have found out is that EOD is ALMOST as effective. In a study I read, the adolescents grew 10cm in the elapsed time with ED INJ and 8cm from the EOD INJ. Clearly GH research is relatively new in scientific terms. For ethical reasons there are not studies on body builders and what is most effective for them so I guess the smart thing would be to play it safe. Either EOD or ED 5-2 would be the best. Cheers.

-LL

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## bluethunder

I have done it all. ED,EOD,6/1 and 5/2 split. I like ED for the short term once levels rise then taper off a bit. 5/2 split is the way to go for myself. No need to monkey around with injections on the weekend. I am evan considering 4/3 split but increasing the iu slightly. I look at the total amount per week not per individual shot.

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## wallycn

> I am by no means an expert but trying..i'm just researching through Pubmed. and other similar journal sources so I hope this helps...taking hgh by I.M gives you a lesser peak but the hgh level is more sustained for longer whereas sub-q has a higher peak and stays for a shorter amount of time.


Is that true, anyone wanna elaborate.

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## PT

i never went 5/2 i always shot twice a day 7 days a week and have always had great gains

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## MMA

> i never went 5/2 i always shot twice a day 7 days a week and have always had great gains


yes, you will have great gains doing it that way. but if you read the study, you'll discover that doing that seriously f*cks your endo production, and hurts your gains for a long time afterwards.

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## kaorialfred

where is that link that you mentioned or the GH forum?

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## Titan1

Do a search i think the name of the thread was -Gh at night?

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## goldenFloyd

how much do you think this study applies to us as it was done on prepubertal 3-9 year olds who were on GH for 30-39 MONTHS? I mean, the study says that dosage "is of no consequence" and before that states that: "The mechanism by which chronic exposure to hGH leads to tolerance, dependence, and a withdrawal syndrome is unclear and does not involve the suppression of hormone secretion." I guess we should check the references, but already I am wondering how applicable this is to fully grown men who are are not deficient naturally and who average 6-9 months on. If GH doesn't supress hormone secretion then is the problem that we are still producing enough of the hormone, but our body just isn't using it as efficiently (kind of like a receptor theory with AAS)?

The prevention of growth deceleration coming off a GH cycle is definitely something that would greatly benefit everyone using it if it was figured out, but are there any other studies that might match our situations more closely? I am sure the "growth" they are talking about in the abstract is physical size growth (height), but is that the best measure for how effective the hormone is for other purposes like fat loss and and new tissue (not bones) growth?

I am frustrated but definitely understand that studies are limited to the "legitimate" purposes of the drug, but if you have more links to some good reads I would definitely appreciate it. 

FYI, i'm part of the 3 hours after bedtime + first thing in the morning, ed crowd  :Smilie:

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