20% of university academics have used ‘steroids for scientists’

Professors, doctors, researchers, students using amphetamines to help them concentrate

One-fifth of the world’s professional scientists and university science students have used “cognition-enhancing” prescription drugs to help them concentrate, according to a survey by a top research journal.

The most common of these “steroids for scientists” is the amphetamine Ritalin, says the journal Nature.

While some officials at Canadian universities expressed surprise at the finding, others said the practice of using drugs to keep alert is well known.

A student diagnosed with attention deficit disorder, which is treated with Ritalin, can become very popular at exam time or when essays and lab work are due, they say.

Nature surveyed its global readership, most of them professors, doctors, corporate researchers and university science students.

The study found found:

– “The most popular is the campus ‘study aid’ Ritalin (methylphenidate), followed by the stimulant Provigil (modafinil) and then blood-pressure drugs called beta blockers, such as propranolol, that reduce anxiety. – “Four-fifths of respondents thought that healthy adults should be allowed to take such drugs if they want to, and almost 70 per cent said they would personally take them. ‘As a professional, it is my duty to use my resources to the greatest benefit of humanity. If ‘enhancers’ can contribute to this humane service, it is my duty to take them,’ wrote an unnamed reader from the United States. – “Although most people believed that children should be protected from such drugs, one-third admitted they would feel pressure to give them to their own children if other children were taking them.” – Of those using drugs, about half used them daily or weekly.

About two-thirds of the survey’s respondents were American.

Canadian reaction to the survey varied widely. At the University of Western Ontario, officials said they had trouble last spring with drug dealers selling Ritalin to students. The other popular drug sold was Dexedrine, a related amphetamine.

Elsewhere, universities seemed surprised.

The University of Calgary says it sees more caffeine pills than prescription pills. David Turpin, president of the University of Victoria (and a career scientist) said he hadn’t heard of the practice.

But in 2005, the University of Michigan estimated that 10 per cent of U.S. college students use prescription drugs to help them study.

“Most students who use their friend’s stimulants do it to improve performance,” said Dr. Scott Teitelbaum, medical director of the Florida Recovery Center at the University of Florida. “It’s like athletes taking steroids—the idea that you can study better, harder, longer, as if you were hitting a ball farther.”

He said Ritalin “revs up” the central nervous system, creating feelings of alertness that are greater than those from caffeine, but less than cocaine.

At Western, Dr. Michael Rieder says it’s hard to estimate how many students use amphetamines. He teaches pediatrics and pharmacology.

“I think it varies from campus to campus and program to program,” he said.

“It’s a fairly recent phenomenon because we haven’t treated adults with ADHD for very long.”

These drugs can be dangerous, he said: Some people tolerate them well, but others can develop high blood pressure, tachycardia (rapid heartbeat) and even strokes.

“They’re prescription for a reason.”

But he said the college students are using the drugs the way they were designed, since they were developed to keep British soldiers awake during the Second World War. The U.S. military now uses stimulants for the crews of long-haul aircraft, he says.

Today, he said, there’s intense competition among grad students and post-doctoral fellows (researchers with new PhDs) especially in the United States.

“They’ll put four ‘post-docs’ on the same project, and only one will get to finish it. If you’re the one who finishes it, that’s the way to promotion and pay,” he said.

Some lab research also demands that students stay awake. For instance, medical and biology studies often require that a student watch nonstop how a cell develops over 24 hours.