Doping review flags heart risks but leaves important comparisons unclear
A synthesis of competitive-sport research links performance-enhancing substance use with cardiovascular risk, while leaving the size and reliability of specific risks difficult to assess.
Based on the published abstract. The full paper may contain additional methods, results and limitations.
The 30-second takeaway
The review reports higher cardiovascular risk with performance-enhancing substance use and describes unintentional doping as a concern in competitive sport. It also summarizes favorable nutrition findings. However, the abstract does not give enough detail to establish how particular substances or nutrition strategies compare, or how reliable the reported benefits are.
The abstract does not identify comparison groups, follow-up periods or certainty ratings for individual results. It also reports nutritional outcomes without enough detail to separate the effects of different strategies.
Several questions were combined
The authors included 60 studies in their narrative synthesis and 31 in the statistical analysis. They considered doping estimates alongside cardiovascular outcomes and nutrition strategies, so the review addresses several different questions rather than one intervention.
Different sources describe different groups
Indirect athlete surveys and official rule-violation records describe different groups. Their percentages should not be treated as interchangeable estimates of accidental doping among all athletes, and they cannot establish the risk posed by any individual supplement.
The original publication
Forensic Perspective of Unintentional Doping, Cardiovascular Health, and the Role of Nutrition in Competitive Sports.
Šoša I
Nutrients · 2026
- PubMed ID
- 41829906
- Record checked
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