Detecting blood manipulation from total hemoglobin mass – minor or major confounding effects of injury, illness, long-lasting exercise, and maturation?

Project Title: Detecting blood manipulation from total hemoglobin mass – minor or major confounding effects of injury, illness, long-lasting exercise, and maturation?

Researchers: W. Schmidt (University of Bayreuth, Germany), C. Gore (Australian Institute of Sport, Australia), N. Prommer (University of Bayreuth, Germany)

Year accepted: 2008

Summary: The aim of this project was, therefore, to detect and to judge confounding factors which may explain possible variations in Hb-mass by other reasons than doping. In this study we focused on the effects on maturation, illness and injury, iron deficiency and iron supplementation, training breaks, and altitude effects. Additionally, methodological aspects of the CO-rebreathing method were considered. In total, data sets from 1881 CO-rebreathing tests of 428 elite and recreational athletes were obtained by two research groups from Australia and Germany.