Blood Doping in Sports and New Testing Methods for Detection

Blood doping is the practice of intravenous infusions of blood or use of a recombinant peptide hormone called erythropoietin (EPO) in order to increase athletic performance. It works by increasing total aerobic reserve by increasing transport of oxygen to muscles being worked. This stimulates not only the amount of oxygen transported, but also maximizes the oxygen used.

Blood doping is popular among cyclists, skiers, runners, and others engaged in heavily aerobic sports who seek a competitive edge though it is illegal. The athletes either use autologous or non-autologous blood for the transfusions. Autologous blood refers to their own blood, while non-autologous is donor blood.

With non-autologous doping, the major antigens of the ABO groups have to be a match with the athlete, but the minor antigens aren't as crucial to match. When EPO was first introduced as an anemia drug in the '80s, blood transfusions were largely abandoned, especially non-autologous ones, because of the risk of contracting bacterial and viral infections, or having a deadly immune reaction. With the advent of a reliable test for EPO, blood transfusions resurged in popularity.

At least four weeks before the competition, but up to eight weeks before, blood is collected from the athlete themselves if they opt for autologous transfusion. The red blood cells (RBCs) are separated from plasma and stored for transfusion via glycerol freezing. This is to preserve the erythrocytes and is critical if storage is longer than three weeks. Upon thawing, the RBCs are transfused into the athlete one to seven days before (s)he is due to compete.