Abstract
In recent decades, steroid abuse has become very popular and widespread among professional and recreational athletes. The aim of this study was to examine the chronic effects of training combined with high doses of nandrolone decanoate on cardiac muscle tissue. The study included 32 Wistar albino rats divided into 4 groups: control (T-N-), steroid (T-N+), exercisetraining (T+N-) and exercise plus steroid (T+N+) groups. The T+N- and T+N+ group swam for 4 weeks, 1 hour per day, 5 days per week. The N+ (nandrolone positive groups) received nandrolone decanoate (20 mg/kg) once per week, subcutaneously. After 4 weeks of training, the rats were sacrificed. Heart biopsy specimens were routinely fixed and embedded in paraffin. Fivemicrometre thick sections were stained with haematoxylin and eosin (H/E) and Masson-Trichrome dyes. Captured microscopic images were processed by special software for image analysis to quantify results. Our results showed that the combination of nandrolone and training causes left ventricular wall thickening of 30%. Average cardiac muscle cell longitudinal diameter was increased by 6% in the T-N+ group, by 16% in the T+N- group and by 25% in the T+N+ group. The cross sectional muscle cell area was increased in the T+N+ group by 33%. Heart collagen content was increased in the nandrolone group compared to the control group by 261%. Collagen content was decreased in the T+N+ group by 34%. High doses of AAS induced left ventricle hypertrophy and excessive heart collagen deposition.