View article

Although people who inject performance- and image-enhancing drugs (PIEDs) report fewer unsafe injecting practices, stigma and discrimination may negatively impact their access to help and information. Engagement with health care services, compared with social networks (friends, relatives, and gym associates) and the Internet and media (steroid user forums, information sites, and magazines), may be important for harm minimization.

A cross-sectional Internet or in-person survey of men who use PIEDs in Australia in 2014–2015 examined differences in sources for PIEDs, injecting equipment, and anabolic-androgenic steroids (AAS) information and factors associated with having periodical medical checks related to PIEDs issues using multivariate logistic regression.

In total, 267 men (mean age: 25 years, SD: 8.7 years; 246 of 267 [92%] reported recent AAS injection) were recruited …