Current Insights into the Steroidal Module of the Athlete Biological Passport

AbstractFor decades, the class of anabolic androgenic steroids has represented the most frequently detected doping agents in athletes’ urine samples. Roughly 50% of all adverse analytical findings per year can be attributed to anabolic androgenic steroids, of which about 2/3 are synthetic exogenous steroids, where a qualitative analytical approach is sufficient for routine doping controls. For the remaining 1/3 of findings, caused by endogenous steroid-derived analytical test results, a more sophisticated quantitative approach is required, as their sheer presence in urine cannot be directly linked to an illicit administration. Here, the determination of urinary concentrations and concentration ratios proved to be a suitable tool to identify abnormal steroid profiles. Due to the large inter-individual variability of both concentrations and ratios, population-based thresholds demonstrated to be of limited practicability, leading to the introduction of the steroidal module of the Athlete Biological Passport. The passport enabled the generation of athlete-specific individual reference ranges for steroid profile parameters. Besides an increase in sensitivity, several other aspects like sample substitution or numerous confounding factors affecting the steroid profile are addressed by the Athlete Biological Passport-based approach. This narrative review provides a comprehensive overview on current prospects, supporting professionals in sports drug testing and steroid physiology.

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Studies of athlete biological passport biomarkers and clinical parameters in male and female users of anabolic androgenic steroids and other doping agents

Drug Testing and Analysis ◽

10.1002/dta.2763 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 12 (4) ◽

pp. 514-523 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Annica Börjesson ◽

Mikael Lehtihet ◽

Alexander Andersson ◽

Marja‐Liisa Dahl ◽

Veronica Vicente ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Anabolic Androgenic Steroids ◽

Clinical Parameters ◽

Male And Female ◽

Biological Passport ◽

Androgenic Steroids

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Effect of Exogenous Anabolic Androgenic Steroids on Testosterone Epitestosterone Ratio and its Application on Athlete Biological Passport in Egypt

Records of Pharmaceutical and Biomedical Sciences ◽

10.21608/rpbs.2018.5337.1013 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 2 (2) ◽

pp. 1-9

Author(s):

hanim ameer ◽

Dina Abo-Elmatty ◽

Rosa Alemany ◽

Noha Mesbah

Keyword(s):

Anabolic Androgenic Steroids ◽

Biological Passport ◽

Androgenic Steroids

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Analytical procedure for steroid profiling valid for Athlete Biological Passport

Chemical Papers ◽

10.1515/chempap-2015-0030 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 69 (2) ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Anna Jarek ◽

Katarzyna Kowalczyk ◽

Piotr Chołbiński ◽

Katarzyna Chajewska ◽

Ewa Turek-Lepa ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Analytical Procedure ◽

Anabolic Androgenic Steroids ◽

Fair Play ◽

Preparation Process ◽

Biosynthesis Pathway ◽

Steroid Biosynthesis ◽

Biological Passport ◽

Steroid Profiling ◽

Main Class ◽

Androgenic Steroids

AbstractAlthough various attempts have been made to eliminate doping in sport, hitherto they all have proved futile. Moreover, the main class of substances that jeopardises the fair play rule remains the same - anabolic androgenic steroids (AAS). To date, longitudinal monitoring of the fluctuations of the endogenous steroids content for a given athlete is regardeded as the most effective approach to the detection of AAS abuse. This is based on the fact that the activity of the steroid biosynthesis pathway may undergo significant changes in response to the AAS administration. This paper presents the entire analytical procedure for quantification of steroids crucial for the Athlete Biological Passport (ABP): testosterone, epitestosterone, dehydroepiandrosterone, androsterone, etiocholanolone, 5-α-androstandiol and 5-β-androstandiol. The procedure consists of a four-step sample preparation process followed by analysis by gas chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry. The limits of quantification for the substances listed above were; 0.44 ng mL

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A comparison of methods to generate adaptive reference ranges in longitudinal monitoring

PLoS ONE ◽

10.1371/journal.pone.0247338 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 16 (2) ◽

pp. e0247338

Author(s):

Davood Roshan ◽

John Ferguson ◽

Charles R. Pedlar ◽

Andrew Simpkin ◽

William Wyns ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Bayesian Approach ◽

Physiological State ◽

Computational Cost ◽

Biological Indicators ◽

Population Based ◽

Individual Variability ◽

Reference Ranges ◽

Individual Level ◽

Expectation Maximisation ◽

The Individual

In a clinical setting, biomarkers are typically measured and evaluated as biological indicators of a physiological state. Population based reference ranges, known as ‘static’ or ‘normal’ reference ranges, are often used as a tool to classify a biomarker value for an individual as typical or atypical. However, these ranges may not be informative to a particular individual when considering changes in a biomarker over time since each observation is assessed in isolation and against the same reference limits. To allow early detection of unusual physiological changes, adaptation of static reference ranges is required that incorporates within-individual variability of biomarkers arising from longitudinal monitoring in addition to between-individual variability. To overcome this issue, methods for generating individualised reference ranges are proposed within a Bayesian framework which adapts successively whenever a new measurement is recorded for the individual. This new Bayesian approach also allows the within-individual variability to differ for each individual, compared to other less flexible approaches. However, the Bayesian approach usually comes with a high computational cost, especially for individuals with a large number of observations, that diminishes its applicability. This difficulty suggests that a computational approximation may be required. Thus, methods for generating individualised adaptive ranges by the use of a time-efficient approximate Expectation-Maximisation (EM) algorithm will be presented which relies only on a few sufficient statistics at the individual level.

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Attitudes Toward Anabolic-Androgenic Steroids Among Non-competing Athletes in Various Types of Sports – A Cross-sectional Study –

Sport Science Review ◽

10.2478/ssr-2013-0006 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 22 (1-2) ◽

pp. 109-128 ◽

Cited By ~ 7

Author(s):

John Singhammer

Keyword(s):

Population Based ◽

Cross Sectional Study ◽

Anabolic Androgenic Steroids ◽

Cross Sectional ◽

Web Based ◽

Positive Attitudes ◽

Preventive Actions ◽

Androgenic Steroids ◽

Sports Data ◽

Population Based Survey

Methods Aims: This study investigated the association between attitudes and intentions to use of anabolic - androgenic - steroids (AAS) between participants in various sports and within sports. Data were derived through a cross - sectional population based survey on 5,010 men and women aged 15 to 60 years. Response - rate was 34%. A combination of postal and web-based questionnaire was used. Data for the present study was restricted to 1,045 males. Results: Prevalence of AAS use was 23 (1.8 %), and 104 (5.3 %) of the respondents had considered AAS - use. On average, respondents that had considered using AAS held more positive attitudes toward AAS - use, compared to respondents without experienced within all types of sports. The biggest difference between considered and non - experienced was observed for Aerobics (1.09 CI, 0.76 - 1.41, R2 = 0.23, p = 0.000). No difference in attitudes to AAS - use between types of sports were observed. Conclusions: Attitudes toward AAS did not vary between types of sports and the level of acceptance was consistently higher among non - competing athletes with intentions to use AAS, regardless of the type of sport. The implication of the observations suggests that preventive actions against AAS use should revolve around individuals suggesting interest in AAS regardless of type of sport.

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Support of a laboratory-hosted Athlete Biological Passport Management Unit (APMU) to the anti-doping organisations

Rechtsmedizin ◽

10.1007/s00194-021-00456-x ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

C. Schobinger ◽

C. Emery ◽

C. Schweizer-Gründisch ◽

T. Kuuranne

Keyword(s):

Evaluation Process ◽

Population Based ◽

Management Unit ◽

Communication Line ◽

Biological Passport ◽

World Anti Doping Agency ◽

Additional Level ◽

High Level ◽

Androgenic Steroids

AbstractThe athlete biological passport (ABP) is an established means for longitudinal monitoring of selected individual biomarkers of an athlete to obtain indirect but potentially long-term indications of the use of substances or methods prohibited in sport. Along the change from population-based reference values to individual profiling, the ABP aims at triggering follow-up investigations concerning the potential use of endogenous substances with doping potential, which might be difficult either to identify with the existing analytical methods or to interpret based only on the results of a single biological sample. The ABP program has been on-going within the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) management since 2009, when the hematological module was officially established to discover blood doping practices, such as administration of erythropoietin (EPO) or application of blood transfusion. Since 2014, the ABP has been complemented by the steroid module, with the aim of targeting the prohibited use of testosterone and other endogenous anabolic androgenic steroids with performance enhancing or masking capability. Although the main objective is to guide and assist the anti-doping organizations in their test distribution plans, the ABP may also be used to proceed with a case to an anti-doping rule violation. Evaluation of biological markers, especially in distinguishing between doping from other confounding factors, requires high level and diversity of expertise, which is coordinated by the athlete biological passport management unit (APMU). Since 2019, the WADA accredited anti-doping laboratories are defined as the host organizations for the APMUs. The benefit of such a structure is to obtain a fully anonymous evaluation process for the passports and an additional level of expertise for the interpretation of analytical results as well as to have a fluent communication line with the analyzing laboratories when further details are needed for the analytical testing and documentation.

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