A Harley Street plastic surgeon claims to have reversed the ageing process by injecting himself with human growth hormone. Can it be true? Vivienne Parry is sceptical
In 1895, a world-renowned neurologist, Charles-Edouard Brown-Séquard, announced that he had beaten the ageing process. He was 72, but with injections of dog testicular extract his muscles had become stronger, his libido had returned and he looked years younger.
The contents of that extract - which we now know to be the hormone testosterone - went on to become the snake oil of the first half of the 20th century, before it was realised that testosterone delays ageing no more than carrots produce 20:20 vision.
A 55-year-old Harley Street plastic surgeon, Dr Jeya Prakash, recently declared that he, too, had cheated ageing, this time with injections of human growth hormone (HGH). He claims to have been dosing himself and his wife with frozen HGH for 15 months.
"People are convinced I've given her plastic surgery," says Prakash, "but she's had nothing except HGH."
Could this treatment be the 21st century's snake oil? In a recent interview with a British newspaper, Prakash declared himself delighted with the results of the thrice-weekly treatment: his skin was "shinier", he felt more "alive" and his libido was "up".
Though experts have lined up to condemn the treatment as dangerous, Prakash is far from alone in his enthusiasm for HGH. Typing "HGH" into an internet search engine returns more than 16 million sites with names such as Nature's Youth, advertising a bewildering array of HGH products - pills, injections, sprays and even things that contain no HGH but are said to prompt its release.
HGH is a protein produced by the pituitary gland at the base of the brain. It is responsible for growth in childhood and thereafter for a host of body functions including many aspects of metabolism. HGH has traditionally been used to help growth hormone-deficient children grow normally (and by athletes who believe it will strengthen their bones and joints). Too much HGH in adulthood can cause acromegaly, a form of gigantism.
In a normal, healthy person, HGH reaches peak production in the teens and then declines steadily so that the total amount of HGH secreted by a 60-year-old man is about half that secreted by a 20-year-old. Many of the things that we don't like about ageing - a decrease in lean body mass and an increase in body fat, brittler bones, thinner skin (leading to wrinkles) - are also features of adults who develop growth hormone deficiency following brain trauma or removal of pituitary tumours.
You can see where this is going. The gist of the long-held argument is this: restore hormone levels to those of youth and you will hold back the years. But it wasn't until 1990 that the theory received some sort of validation, when the world's most prestigious medical journal, the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM), published a study by a Dr Daniel Rudman of Wisconsin.
It involved 12 healthy men over the age of 60 who were given HGH at twice the dose normally given to HGH-deficient adults, three times a week for six months. They improved lean body mass and skin thickness (lessening wrinkles). It was a call to arms for the anti-ageing industry, prompting the formation of the American Association of Anti-Ageing Medicine. Growth hormone is now the most potent weapon in its arsenal.
The NEJM grew so tired of its study being used to promote dubious products that you cannot download the Rudman paper without receiving a stern commentary from the editor, saying anti-ageing therapy with HGH has not been proved effective.
Since the Rudman research, other studies have reproduced his findings, but most have not. Most significantly, there are no follow-up studies of those given HGH to show long-term effects such as increased rates of cancer.
There are four major problems with HGH as an elixir of life. First, because it is a protein, it is broken down in the gut so it is only effective if injected (not that this stops anyone from selling useless oral or inhaled preparations). Second, because it was originally manufactured from human brain material, there was a risk of CJD; this barrier was removed when DNA technology allowed its safe production. Third, it is expensive - about £50,000 (€74,000) for a course of treatment for a HGH-deficient child.
But the most important problem is this: if something has a biological effect, it will also have side effects. Some were already known through the abuse of HGH by athletes: heart failure, diabetes and cancer. Advocates responded that with minute doses of HGH, there were no side effects. And no benefits either. Prakash also advocates low dosages, saying they are "as safe as vitamin C".
The other thing to bear in mind with HGH is that while it changes body composition, it does not improve function.
Animal studies show that mice with super-high levels of growth hormone have significantly shorter lifespans than normal mice. It suggests that HGH deficiency, in itself, does not cause accelerated ageing. The opposite may be true. Those who age best may, paradoxically, be those with lower, not higher levels of HGH.
The sad fate of Brown-Séquard should be a lesson to all would-be rejuvenators. His preparation was water-based and therefore contained no testosterone, which is not water soluble. So his rejuvenation was simply a triumph of hope and self delusion. He died a broken man, covered in sores caused by all those injections, just two years later. - (Guardian service)
•Vivienne Parry is the author of The Truth about Hormones, published by Atlantic Books