Warning to doctors over steroid stories, By: Linda Silmailis

August 27, 2006

THE state's medical watchdog has issued a warning to doctors against prescribing anabolic steroids to sportsmen or bodybuilders amid anecdotal evidence the practice is on the rise.

The warning from the NSW Medical Board follows an increase in notifications from pharmacists of doctors inappropriately prescribing the drugs.

The board's medical director, Dr Alison Reid, said there were concerns some doctors could be being offered financial rewards to engage in the practice.

"There are always two or three every year, but we have a feeling there has been a bit of an escalation in the practice," she said.

"There are severe consequences, and you would have to conclude there must be a reward incentive for doctors to take that risk.

"The implications for patients are well-documented and any doctor who takes this risk is either naive or getting some reward."

Last year, six doctors were reprimanded or deregistered for prescribing offences.

The NSW Medical Tribunal last month struck off a doctor for handing out steroids to bodybuilders.

The tribunal heard that Wallis Lam had given 23 patients anabolic/androgenic steroids and prescribed human growth hormone to five people.

In its latest newsletter to doctors, the board warns that doctors found prescribing anabolic steroids face deregistration. "Several doctors have recently been prosecuted and more cases are in the pipeline," it said.

"Given the harm associated with the use of performance-enhancing drugs, including death and serious, lifelong morbidity, doctors who ignore this advice do this at their peril."