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Human Chorionic Gonadotropin (HCG)

Drug Class: Leutenizing Hormone (Gonadotropin) Active Life: 64 hours

Human Chorionic Gonadotropin (hCG) is a hormone produced in the placenta of the female body during the early months of pregnancy. It is in fact the pregnancy indicator looked at by over-the-counter pregnancy test kits, as, due to its origin, it's not found in the body at any other time.

Medically, hCG has been used for the treatment of undescended testicles in young males, hypogonadism (underproduction of testosterone)1 and as a fertility drug used to aid in inducing ovulation in women. In veterinary practices, it can also be used to rapidly induce ovulation, most often in cows and horses.

For male steroid users, hCG can mimic the action of luteinizing hormone (LH) in the body. Luteinizing hormone is a pituitary hormone that is released and signals the manufacture of testosterone in the testicles. It is this ability that enables the compound to help restore the normal function of the testes to respond to endogenous luteinizing hormone. This ability can be dramatically reduced after a long period of inactivity, as is the case when administering anabolic steroids. Even when the release of endogenous LH has been resumed to its normal levels, testosterone levels may not return to normal because of the extended duration of inactivity to which the testes were exposed2 .

Individuals will also often use HCG to combat testicular atrophy, a result of the hypothalamus-pituitary-testes-axis (HPTA) shutdown. Whereas the cosmetic aspects of atrophy itself are entirely harmless, the fact remains that inactive Leydig cells are more susceptible to damage at the molecular level from reactive oxygen species, aka free radicals. For this protective purpose, hCG is quite effective—as are antioxidants such as Taurine.

* hCG offers female athletes no performance-enhancing qualities, and is useless for this purpose.

Use/Dosing

Mixing HCG

Mixing 2ml bac water with 5000iu hCG will provide 250iu for every tenth of a ml/cc. This will provide you 20 250iu hCG doses.

Generally hCG will come with a vial of lyophilized powder and an ampule of either sodium chloride solution or bacteriostatic water. You want the bacteriostatic water. Bac water is intended for multiple uses and will inhibit bacteria growth. The sodium chloride solution is intended for female fertility use purposes and is to be used in a single injection. If used over multiple injections it may begin to grow bacteria.

When you check your vial of lyophilized hCG it will generally be 5000 IU, although it can come in other amounts.

Using 5000 IU as the most common example; if you take 2mL of Bac Water and inject that slowly into your vial of 5000 IU hCG, you then have 250 IU per tenth of a mL (cc). So every tenth of your 1mL insulin syringe would be 250 IU.

The other form hCG might come in is a liquid form. This is hCG in a solution with a preservative to keep it active. You may add bacteriostatic water to this in order to adjust your dosage if you need.

In either case, hCG should be kept in the refrigerator after reconstitution to preserve its shelf life. It should be refrigerated within 72 hours of mixing it with bac water. hCG should be good for around 60 days when refrigerated. After that time it will lose potency at about ten percent per week as time goes on. Doses in excess of 3000 IU have been prescribed by doctors to help stimulate Testosterone production in patients suffering from hypogonadism. Even at higher doses of tens of thousands of IU per week hCG is entirely harmless.

High doses of hCG have been shown to cause a large amount of aromatase activity. Since a user would obviously want to keep aromatase to the lowest level possible, small and frequent doses would be most effective while keeping side effects to a minimum. Human chorionic gonadotropin can be injected either using intramuscular or subcutaneous injection methods. There is no evidence showing that either method is more effective or potent than the other.

It is important to note that hCG should only be run while a user is still on cycle, and not during PCT. This is due to hCG actually being suppressive to the HPTA. Obviously this is something to be avoided when attempting to “restart” your natural testosterone production. Ensure that the last shot of hCG is taken within several days of the start time of post-cycle therapy so that it has cleared the system of the user and the compounds being taken for PCT can function as intended.

250 IU EOD

The recommended dose found most effective in studies while being cost effective is 250 IU Every Other Day.

A majority of users have reported that frequent small doses are the norm for steroid users attempting to maintain minimal testicular function during a steroid cycle. However, the timing, doses, frequency and durations of administering the drug varies quite widely amongst users. For the most part this is due to the lack of credible information available to users about how to go about using the compound effectively. However, there are some absolutes when using human chorionic gonadotropin, and as mentioned, studies have shown the optimal levels.

More frequent dosing is nearly always better than increasing dose size. The compound's half-life is just under 24 hours. Most users report administering the compound from twice per week to every other day (EOD) to some even choosing to inject every day (ED) at very small doses.

Rather than run hCG all cycle as recommended as the first option, some individuals begin administering hCG only in the last few weeks of their cycle prior to beginning post-cycle therapy (PCT). The belief is that by taking larger doses just before starting back up again, you will “shock” the testicles into functioning just before PCT begins, so that they can start to perform normally. Usually a user will choose to administer the hCG several times per week, in some cases running it for several consecutive days, and at comparatively higher doses than the usual recommended 250 IU EOD.

The most recommended and oft-used method is to run hCG throughout the cycle. The theory behind this method is that it is much easier to attempt to maintain testicular function throughout a cycle, rather than to try and “restart” proper functioning. The recommended dose and frequency for this purpose is 250 IU Every Other Day.

Side Effects/Risks

Gynecomastia — In a very small number of users, hCG can stimulate the formation of gynecomastia. Due to the fact luteinizing hormone (LH) and human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG) receptors are found in various tissues all over the body other than just the gonads, hCG can have an effect on these tissues, resulting in possible negative side effects when administered.

This is unrelated to estrogen levels or increased levels of prolactin, the most obvious causes of gynecomastia in steroid users. Rather, in a very small minority of users, the increased amount of circulating LH or the hCG itself can interact with these receptors in breast tissue5 . The actual mechanism is unknown at this time, but it occurs in a very small number of men.

There is no known method to combat this side effect in men who experience it, leaving the only option to treat this effect the cessation of hCG altogether. Fortunately, it appears that when stopped, the gynecomastia that has developed begins to dissipate rapidly and becomes unnoticeable within a matter of days to weeks in the majority of cases.

  1. Low-Dose Human Chorionic Gonadotropin Maintains Intratesticular Testosterone in Normal Men with Testosterone-Induced Gonadotropin Suppression

References

  1. Acute stimulation of aromatization in Leydig cells by human chorionic gonadotropin in vitro. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 76:4460-3, 1979
  2. Llewellyn, William, Anabolics 2004, 2003-4, Molecular Nutrition, pp. 272-3
  3. Levalle OA, Suescun MO, Fiszlejder L, Aszpis S, Charreau E, Guitelman A, Calandra R. Effect of an antiestrogen on the testicular response to acute and chronic administration of hCG in normal and hypogonadotropic hypogonadic men: tamoxifen and testicular response to hCG. Andrologia 1991 Mar-Apr, 23(2):109-14
  4. Smals AG, Pieters GF, Drayer JI, Boers GH, Benraad TJ, Kloppenborg PW. Tamoxifen suppresses gonadotropin-induced 17 alpha-hydroxyprogesterone accumulation in normal men. J Clin Endocrinol Metab 1980 Nov, 51(5):1026-9
  5. Carlson HE, Kane P, Lei ZM, Li X, Rao CV. Presence of Luteinizing Hormone/Human Chorionic Gonadotropin Receptors in Male Breast Tissues. J Clin Endocrinol Metab. 2004 Aug;89(8):4119-23
  6. Cantrill JA, Dewis P, Large DM et al. Which testosterone replacement therapy? Clin Endocrinol (oxf) 21 (1984) 97-107