Steroids: Quick and sometimes dangerous fix to a perfect body

During the more than 20 years that Coach Robert Dean has been involved in sports, he's seen people do a lot of things to be the best.

That includes using steroids to enhance their physique and increase their stamina, the 34-year-old high school football coach said.

"People in sports want to win, and sometimes for some people that means compromising their values and doing something they know is wrong," Dean said.

Dean, who coaches football and powerlifting at Little Cypress-Mauriceville High School, was a high school athlete in the 1980s. Back then, he said, "There was always somebody somewhere" using steroids.

Like a fad that won't go away, steroid abuse has fluctuated over the years, experts say. Its use began fading about 10 years ago after a surge a decade earlier. But now, athletes and doctors say, steroid use - and the availability of the performance enhancers - seems to on the rise.

Last week, narcotics officers seized anabolic steroids - both pill and injectible forms - at a Lumberton fitness center. Two men associated with the center were arrested last Wednesday and each charged with possession of a controlled substance.

Joel Alex Miller, 29, of Nederland, and 33-year-old Bryan Allen Fusileir, of Mauriceville, were later released from the Hardin County Jail after they each posted a $10,000 bond.

Investigators believe the steroids seized were ordered on-line and came from Mexico.

An Internet search for steroids reveals that investigators might have plenty of reasons for their speculations.

An Internet search on Google showed dozens of Web sites on steroids and performance-enhancing drugs with links to several other related sites.

Some of the Web sites list the different steroids and their benefits. Others warn of the drugs' harmful - and potentially fatal - side effects.

Several of the Web sites offer suggestions on drug combinations and dosing schedules that would provide the fastest and best results. Some even instruct potential steroid users on how to inject themselves and how to avoid steroid detection in urine testing.

Several of the Internet sites mention foreign addresses as sources for the drugs.

"I'd say in the last two years I've had more people come in and ask for them," said Dr. Glenn Babus, an Orange physician. "They hear about something, probably read about it on the Internet, and ask me what I think."

The requests for steroids comes mostly from young men in their late teens and early 20s, Babus said. However, he said women have asked about them, too.

Babus, who also has an office in Baytown, specializes in sports medicine and pain management. Many of his patients are recuperating from injuries and sometimes get discouraged by their slow recovery, he said.

"They see it as a quick fix," he said of steroids. "They don't realize they're playing Russian roulette with the side effects."

As a former emergency room doctor, Babus said he has seen first-hand the damage that steroid abuse can cause. He also has seen doctors misguide patients by prescribing steroids for purposes not intended by its manufacturers.

There are two types of steroids on the market, and both have legitimate uses and potentially harmful side effects, Babus said.

Catabolic steroids, which include prednisone and deflazacort, are used to treat a variety of medical conditions including asthma, arthritis and some forms of cancer. Also known as glucocorticoids and corticosteroids, catabolic steroids help the body break down tissue to release glucose and mobilize energy.

Catabolic steroids would not be consumed by athletes seeking to bulk up their bodies, because the drugs break down rather than build up muscle tissue, unlike anabolic steroids.

Developed in the 1930s, anabolic steroids have few legitimate uses, and doctors seldom prescribe them anymore because of their serious side effects, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

Medical uses for anabolic steroids include anemia, severe burns and some forms of women's cancers.

The side effects of anabolic steroids are numerous and wide-ranging. They can include physical changes and psychological impairment in both sexes.

Men may experience withered testicles, sterility and impotence. In women, irreversible masculine traits can develop, including a deepening of the voice and the growth of facial hair. Women also may experience menstrual irregularities, breast reduction and infertility.

The psychological side effects of anabolic steroids in both sexes include aggression and combative behavior, often referred to as "'roid rage."

Myra Sanders, a parent of two high school athletes in the LC-M school district, said she has never worried about her sons taking steroids because they know about the drugs' side effects.

"We have discussed it after seeing something on TV about it," Sanders said. "I know the coaches preach against it."

Sanders' son, David, a 16-year-old junior at LC-M High School, said random drug testing likely discourages student athletes from taking steroids.

"I've heard guys joking that maybe they should take steroids to bulk up. But we all know they're not serious about it," he said.

Coach Dean said he's known several athletes who have taken steroids, but none of them were during his seven years coaching high school students.

Most of the steroids users he has known are not competitive athletes. They are men and women so concerned with their physical appearance and so impatient with getting the desired results that they are willing to take a dangerous short cut, he said.

It's easy to spot steroid users in a gym, Dean said. They are the ones with so much muscle mass and such defined physiques that it's almost impossible to think they got that way without some chemical help.

"I'll see a guy who was a scrawny weakling in high school and now he's all bulked up. I'll think there's no way," Dean said.