Drugs abuse in sports: Doping control process and guidelines

According to International Olympic Committee (IOC), Doping is the ‘Administration of or use by a competing Athlete of any substance foreign to the body or any physiological substance taken in abnormal quantity or taken by an abnormal route of entry in to the body with the sole purpose of increasing in an artificial and unfair manner his/her performance in competition.’ To check such practices, the IOC has devised a list of substances banned for use by sports persons in competitions/training. Dope testing in Olympics began in 1968, but till 1983, drug testing and detection in International competitions were very ineffective, due to the non-availability of standard technology. During 1983 Pan American Games in Caracus, Professor Donike of Cologne set the stage for the present sophisticated drug testing in sport by introducing gas chromatography and mass spectrometry (GC-MS) in the analytical process. In the year 2000 during Sydney Olympics, analytical procedure for blood testing of erythropoietin and human growth hormone were developed and implemented.