Sport-Related Injury and Performance Enhancing Substance Use by Young Athletes.

Background: Legal performance enhancing substance (PES) use is increasing in young athletes and may lead to banned PES use. This study examines legal PES use and consideration of banned PES use in young athletes with a season-ending injury (SEI) compared to young athletes with non-SEI/no previous injury.

Hypothesis: Young athletes sustaining SEI or concussions have increased odds of reporting legal PES use and consideration of banned PES use compared with non-SEI or no injury.

Study design: Cross-sectional study.

Level of evidence: Level 4.

Methods: Cross-sectional study from 2013 to 2020 of athletes aged 6 to 25 years.

Results: No association was found between reporting legal PES use or consideration of banned PES use and young athletes with SEI or concussion compared with no injury/non-SEI. 14% of athletes reported legal PES use and 3% reported consideration of banned PES use. In adjusted analysis, athletes who were male (odds ratio [OR], 1.38; 95% CI, 1.16-1.73; P = 0.03), have history of depression (OR, 3.01; 95% CI, 1.26-7.18; P = 0.01), weight train (OR, 1.66; 95% CI, 1.04-2.65; P = 0.03), and believe that athletic ability is influenced by weight (OR, 1.75; 95% CI, 1.08-2.83; P = 0.02) had increased odds of reporting legal PES use. Older (OR, 1.18; 95% CI, 1.03-1.36; P = 0.02) and male (OR, 1.57; 95% CI, 1.02-1.81; P < 0.04) athletes had increased odds of consideration of banned PES use.

Conclusion: This study found no increased odds of reported PES use in young athletes with sports-related injury or concussion regardless of injury type or severity. Factors associated with PES use were male sex, age, history of depression, weight training, and belief that weight affects athletic performance.

Clinical relevance: Risk factors associated with PES use in young athletes are essentially unknown. This study can inform pertinent clinical care, education, and policy implementation.