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HGH quackery HGH and hGH refer to "human growth hormone" (cf hCG, human chorionic gonadotropin). The reader may be curious as to why only these two hormones are still often referred to as "human" when the term could obviously be appended to every hormone in the list. After three-letter abbreviations of amino acids were found so useful in the 1950s, endocrinologists in the 1950s tended to favor 3 letter abbreviations even for two-word hormones. At that time, most of the hormones available for administration, especially the proteins, were derived from animals. Most were similar, if not identical, to human hormones in structure and effectiveness.

However, animal growth hormones were relatively ineffective in humans because of structural differences. Growth hormone purified from human pituitaries was a rare commodity and the abbreviation HGH distinguished it from animal growth hormones in medical reports. When synthetic, human-sequence GH made by recombinant DNA technology replaced use of cadaver hGH in the mid-1980s, the term HGH no longer made sense. The abbreviation rGH refers to synthetic human-sequence GH made by recombinant DNA technology.

The internet consumer should understand that use of the term HGH since 1990 usually indicates that the author has little expertise in endocrinology and is a nearly infallible sign that a product so labeled contains no effective amount of growth hormone. A Field Guide to the Growth Hormone Scams In certain circumstances, growth hormone treatment can improve a child’s growth, enhance an athlete’s performance, slow certain physical aspects of aging in adults, increase muscle mass and reduce body fat, improve mental energy and resilience, and reduce risk of death from heart disease! Is it any wonder that GH has also been the subject of exaggerated claims, ineffective use, and outright fraud? So how do you separate the legitimate uses from the wasteful, unproven, or even dangerous? The majority of the products sold as growth hormone and virtually all of the products sold as “HGH” will do nothing worthwhile for your body. If you don’t have time to become board-certified in endocrinology, how do you recognize the outright frauds? Luckily, I became board-certified in endocrinology so you wouldn’t have to. Yes, I’m that good a friend!

Logically, this guide should begin with an extended explanation of what growth hormone is and how it is produced by the pituitary, followed by an excursion into the wonders of insulin-like growth factors. BUT this stuff is eye-glazing for most people, and even doctors have been known to tune out when an endocrinologist tries to explain the higher arcana of the hypothalamus. YOU probably want the executive synopsis first. Okay, if you promise me you’re an executive, here it is:

Top ten signs you are contemplating a product that is unlikely to produce a significant, measurable benefit1 for you (or your child):

10. Your IGF and post-stimulation GH levels have not been checked.2

9. The product is not FDA approved and does not require a prescription.3

8. No list of possible side effects is offered,4 and nothing’s going to be monitored during treatment.5

7. The sales pitch refers to Rudman’s paper6 or Klatz’s book.7

6. The product is available as a nasal or oral spray8, drop8, pills8, skin lotion9, aroma9, or digital vibration.10

5. The offer is accompanied by a multilevel marketing pitch.11

4. The offer refers to the product as “natural,”12 as “homeopathic,13 or as “HGH.”14

3. The product contains amino acids described as “releasers or “precursors.”15

2. The sales pitch contains a message such as “this information and product are not intended to diagnose or treat any disease.”16

And finally, the number 1 sign that you will probably derive no measurable benefit from this purported GH product: 1. It is being offered to you by anyone except an endocrinologist who has evaluated you or your child,17 has explained that tests indicate probable growth hormone deficiency,2 is charging you a couple hundred dollars,18 and is telling you the GH treatment will cost thousands of dollars a year.19

What do all those tiny numbers mean?

1. significant, measurable benefit Measurable benefit means a change in a body that can be objectively measured, and is a greater change than would happen without the treatment. Examples of such objectively measurable potential benefits include acceleration of rate of growth, improvement of measured muscle strength, increased bone density, reduction of percent body fat, reduction of cholesterol level, reduction of heart attack rate or fracture rate in a population. Some potential benefits, such as mental energy, social resilience, mood, or sex drive, are difficult to measure objectively. Some claimed benefits are so vague (overall well-being or better luck) or intangible (balanced chakras, reduced subluxation, shorter time in purgatory) that it would be impossible to objectively confirm or refute that they have occurred. Intelligent people should be wary of treatments whose benefits are exclusively of these types. Significant means that the benefit is great enough that the average person will consider it worth the effort, cost, and risk of treatment. For example, how much would you pay for a treatment that produced a one point reduction of your cholesterol? Not much, I hope. Assessments of intangible benefits, or of “significance” are of course value judgements, and the seller of a minimally efficacious product can hide behind such issues. If you suspect that your assessment of significant effectiveness is much different from mine, my opinions may not apply to you or your product.

2. IGF and post-stimulation GH levels How do we know if someone will benefit from GH treatment? The most reliable indicator of probable significant, objective benefit is that the person has GH deficiency. GH deficiency means that the person makes much less GH day by day than most healthy people of the same age and sex. A child who is severely deficient in GH will be very small, will grow slowly, and will have a delayed bone age maturation. GH replacement will safely reverse all these things and will induce catch-up growth until the child reaches the height he “should” reach. An adult who is severely deficient will usually have poor muscle strength, an increased amount of body fat, reduced bone density, higher levels of cholesterol, reduced stamina, even reduced social energy and ambition, and a higher than average chance of dying at a younger age than someone not deficient. Growth hormone replacement will safely improve all these things. Wow! So what percent of children are below average in height? Fifty percent. What percent of short children would grow a lot faster and end up a lot taller with GH? Less than one in a hundred. What percent of adults feel like they could use stronger bones, less body fat, lower cholesterol, more strength, energy, and drive, and a longer life? Maybe 90%? What percent of the adult population is GH deficient? Less than 1%; the rest are just a target for the GH scams. There are lots of more common reasons than GH deficiency for people to be shorter, weaker, fatter, more tired, or less socially effective than they would like to be. There are lots of more common reasons than GH deficiency for people to have high cholesterol, to have weak bones, or to die prematurely. Remember, 50% of the population is below average! And if we make everyone in the population 200% healthier, 50% of the population will still be below average. So how can you tell if your child’s shortness or your fatigue is due to GH deficiency? Amounts and patterns of GH in the blood are lower, as are the levels of other proteins such as IGF-1 and IGF-BP3. See below for more details on normal and deficient patterns. In many cases the pituitary gland is structurally abnormal if sensitive imaging of the brain is performed (like an MRI). Unfortunately, criteria for diagnosing GH deficiency are actually much more complex than making a diagnosis of thyroid deficiency or iron deficiency. No single test is completely sensitive (detects all cases of deficiency) or specific (is never positive in a person without deficiency), and the diagnosis is usually based on several pieces of evidence.

3. not FDA approved and does not require a prescription This means that the maker of the product does not want to submit research studies to the FDA which demonstrate safety and efficacy, and that the product contains what he says it contains. He would rather you take his word for all three. This is called “health freedom.”

4. No list of possible side effects Side effects are simply effects on the body that are unwanted. It is rare for a substance to have only desired effects on the body if it has any effects at all. The highest probability of beneficial effects with the lowest chance of unwanted effects occurs when we administer the right amount of a substance that the body needs but lacks. Some examples of treatment which produce significant, measurable beneficial effect with very low risk of unwanted effects include replacement of the right amount of oxygen to a person in respiratory failure, thyroxine to a person with hypothyroidism, protein to a person who is starving, glucose to a person who is unconscious from hypoglycemia, iron to a person with iron deficiency, vitamin B12 to a person with pernicious anemia, and insulin to a person with juvenile diabetes. The benefits in these cases can be nearly miraculous, yet there is still a small chance of producing an unwanted effect as well. Furthermore, when a person does not have hypoxia, hypothyroidism, starvation, hypoglycemia, iron deficiency, pernicious anemia, or juvenile diabetes, the likelihood and size of the beneficial effects is much smaller, but the chance of unwanted effects is no lower and may even be higher. Growth hormone provided in the right amount to a person who is deficient produces similarly spectacular results, but there are still a few potential risks. Potential risks of GH therapy at the right dose in deficient children include small chances of a problem with the hip joint (called slipped capital femoral epiphysis), headaches due to increased pressure in the head (called pseudotumor cerebri), tiny bruises at injection sites, slight pain with injections, the nuisance of doctor visits and blood tests, and perhaps the emotional stress of increased attention to the child’s unsatisfactory height. Potential risks of GH at the right dose in deficient adults include pseudotumor cerebri, injection bruises or pain, insurance or employment problems related to an expensive medical condition, temporary fluid retention, temporary joint or limb swelling or discomfort, carpal tunnel syndrome, the nuisance of doctor visits and blood tests, and perhaps the emotional stress of a long-term medical condition. The magnitude of benefit is reduced in persons who are not deficient, but there is no reduction of the side effect risk. Excessive amounts of anything, including such necessities of life as light, water, salt, oxygen, glucose, protein, and vitamins can be harmful. This is especially true of hormones. In general, the magnitude of benefit shrinks and the likelihood of potential side effects rises as the dose of a hormone increases, or when it is given to someone who is not deficient. Risks of excessive amounts of GH are inferred from naturally occurring conditions of GH excess. In adults, excessive production of GH by the pituitary gland leads to a condition known as acromegaly. Connective tissue thickens and becomes less flexible. Skin is thickened, with increased production of oil and sweat. Lips, nose, tongue, brow ridges, and jaw can grow, distorting facial appearance. Larger nasal sinuses can lead to recurrent sinusitis. Nerves and joints can be damaged leading to pain, tingling, or reduction of sensation or reflexes in the legs or arms. In some cases, the muscles become abnormally weak. The person becomes less sensitive to insulin, which sometimes results in type 2 diabetes. The death rate for persons in their 40s with acromegaly is approximately twice expected. The likelihood of these acromegalic effects is minimal when replacement doses are given to deficient people, but rises with excessive amounts given to people who are not deficient. Finally, remember that the only products that have no side effects are those that have no effects at all, such as the homeopathic preparations that contain infinitesimal amounts.13

5. Nothing’s going to be monitored during treatment An endocrinologist will monitor a person receiving GH for both wanted and unwanted effects. We follow growth, bone maturation, bone density, muscle strength, lipids, and/or body composition, depending on desired benefits. We follow IGF levels to avoid overtreatment, and we see the person periodically to detect unwanted effects.

6. Rudman’s paper This famous paper from the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine reported real research by a real endocrinologist (Dan Rudman). It described modest improvements in some physical parameters such as bone density and muscle strength in a small number of older men treated with real growth hormone for a few months. The men were not severely GH deficient by standard criteria. The paper was widely publicized in the mass news media, leading to much prediction that GH would be used routinely to slow aging in all of us. Larger subsequent studies showed conflicting or less impressive results and of course were less interesting to the news media. Duration of benefit and real risks of GH supplementation in non-deficient men has yet to be settled by long-term research. The paper is routinely cited by the sellers of products that they hope you will confuse with real growth hormone. In many cases the paper is cited in such a way as to imply that Rudman was testing their product. Do you think this is honest? I don’t. Dr. Rudman has no connection with these products and was using real GH. The exact citation if you’d like to read the paper: Rudman D, Feller AG, Nagraj HS et al (1990). Effect of human growth hormone in men over 60 years old. New Engl J Med 323:1-6.

7. Klatz’s book In 1997, Dr. Ronald Klatz published Grow Young With HGH: The Amazing Medically Proven Plan To Reverse the Effects Of Aging (New York:Harper-Collins, 1997). It is a fairly uncritical touting of GH as the answer to aging. Again, although fraud artists cite the book incessantly, Dr. Klatz was referring only to real growth hormone. Sellers of products with similar names hope you will think he was writing about their product. I don’t think that is honest either. Dr. Klatz’s book is a fine representative of a genre of books written by doctors for the public to tout the wonders of a new hormone. A classic example is The Male Hormone: A new gleam of hope for prolonging man's prime of life, written by Paul de Kruif (Garden City: Garden City, 1945). I mention it only because its promotion of testosterone for Everyman is so strikingly similar to the GH claims. Only the hormones change—the claims continue to be the desiderata of everyone past 50: vigor, energy, strength, slimness, protection from heart disease, etc, etc. “Those ignorant of history are condemned to repeat it.”

8. The product is available as a nasal or oral spray, drop, pills Right. Do you really think we prescribe GH by injection to children when there is an oral spray that does the same thing? GH, like other large protein hormones, will be largely digested in the stomach and very little intact hormone will be transported into the blood. Many large pharmaceutical companies are spending millions of dollars trying to discover a way to get proteins into the blood without needles. And you are supposed to believe that the bozo who sent you a spam e-mail has beaten them? They are lying to you, gentle reader.

9. skin lotion, aroma I did see one advertisement for a lotion called something like KH3/GH10. It claimed that it contained GH precursors to be rubbed into the skin of any body part that you want to make bigger. I haven’t yet seen an aromatherapy claim related to GH, but I haven’t looked. Please let me know if you find one.

10. digital manipulations This is a pun, referring simultaneously to two different potential health scams. If you don’t understand it, don’t worry about it. In honesty, I haven’t seen either in connection with GH, but that’s probably because I haven’t looked very hard.

11. a multilevel marketing pitch Do you have to be told to be wary of companies that are more interested in getting you to sell their product than buy it? If you’ve bitten this hook before, are you still using the product? The product is certainly not growth hormone.

12. “natural” In connection with a health product, “natural” means “can be sold by someone who isn’t licensed to write prescriptions.” The health food shops, vitamin stores, and alternative boutiques call everything “natural,” even if it’s made in a factory. Ironically it’s a downright frightening claim in relation to GH. The last truly natural GH was the human GH extracted from pituitary glands collected by pathologists at autopsies from the 1960s to the early 1980s. We stopped using it in 1984 when we discovered that a few people contracted Creutzfeldt-Jacob disease, a “natural” but fatal infection otherwise known as “mad cow disease.” This example alone should persuade you to mistrust anyone who thinks natural is a synonym for safe.

13. “homeopathic” This is my favorite. Real growth hormone is pretty expensive, about $10 to $100 a day, depending on the dose needed. What if you could buy 1 vial of GH and dissolve it in a thousand tanks of water? You could divide it up into a million little bottles and still have a product with real GH in it! Yet if you dissolved it in so much water that no amount could be detected, you wouldn’t have to register it with the FDA, would you? If you marketed it to people who didn’t need real GH, no harm is done, right? If you don’t know the story of the emperor’s new clothes, you are the prey of the sellers of homeopathic GH. A fuller explanation of homeopathy can be found at: http://www.quackwatch.com/01QuackeryRelatedTopics/homeo.html

14. “HGH” Back in the 1960s, endocrinologists devised a variety of three letter abbreviations for the clinically important hormones, similar to the standard three letter abbreviations of the biochemists for the amino acids. Growth hormone was more species-specific in its action than other hormones like thyroxine or insulin, and several animal preparations of growth hormone were being used in research. The designation HGH referring to “human growth hormone” was widely adopted. The distinction “human” became either meaningless or ambiguous with the advent of synthetic protein hormones of human sequence produced by recombinant DNA technology from bacteria (E. coli, to be precise). At the same time, GH from real human beings was abandoned because of the CJD risk. Is it correct to refer to synthetic, human-sequence GH made in a factory by bacteria as HGH? Real endocrinologists seldom refer to growth hormone as HGH these days. Nevertheless, perhaps because of Dr. Klatz’ book, there are plenty of products that use the initials to make you think they are growth hormone. Many of them don’t actually spell out growth hormone because they don’t contain any. It is legal, but is it honest to call something HGH when it contains no growth hormone?

15. amino acids described as “releasers” or “precursors” This claim is pretty clever. Several of the amino acids, if given by mouth or by IV, can induce the pituitary gland to release a burst of GH. We take advantage of this phenomenon in diagnostic testing. Intravenous administration of arginine usually produces a brief rise in the blood level of GH in healthy people. A person with GH deficiency will usually fail to respond. A low-budget version of this test used for years in England was the Bovril stimulation test. Bovril was a brand of beef bouillon that had enough amino acids to induce a brief GH rise in most children. People with GH deficiency cannot be treated with amino acids to increase their GH because their pituitaries don’t respond well to them. On the other hand, if your pituitary will respond to amino acids, then you are not deficient and are unlikely to benefit from more GH. Furthermore, the GH rise after amino acids only lasts about 20 minutes, and diminishes with repeated doses or concurrent carbohydrate consumption. Nevertheless, clever marketers have found gold in these facts. Hey, let’s market some cheap waste protein (like connective tissue collagen remaining on cow carcasses after the meat is removed) as a “natural GH releaser”! It’s not dishonest because (a) amino acids do increase GH levels in most people, (b) more GH helps deficient people be younger, slimmer, more energetic, etc, (c) this protein does contain amino acids. Wow, all true! What they don’t tell you is (a) the amount of extra GH produced by daily use of their product is quite small and lasts about 20 minutes, (b) no benefit has ever been demonstrated from slightly increased amounts of GH in non-deficient people, (c) no benefit has ever been demonstrated from their product, and (d) some beef bouillon or canned tuna would be a whole lot cheaper and just as effective. The “precursor” claim is even stupider. All proteins, including GH, are strings of amino acids. Ultimately, most of the amino acids come from our diet. Therefore, any amino acids we might happen to eat, whether from a pill or our last hamburger or that hydrolyzed cow carcass collagen, just might end up in a GH molecule. I mean, it could happen… Yes, that’s all they mean by “precursors.” If you’re going to pay $10 an ounce for protein, you might as well buy a good steak.

16. a message such as “this information and product are not intended to diagnose or treat any disease.” This statement is usually the most truthful statement in the entire sales pitch. Believe it.

17. an endocrinologist who has evaluated you or your child, There are pediatric endocrinologists and internist endocrinologists. A pediatric endocrinologist will often be more efficient and accurate at assessing a short child or adolescent, and will refuse to evaluate a 50 year old. The converse is usually but not invariably true of internist endocrinologists. Few other doctors have much training or expertise in growth hormone deficiency or use. Many insurance companies will only pay for GH prescribed by an endocrinologist.

18. charging you a couple hundred dollars Making a diagnosis of GH deficiency is often more complex and difficult than the diagnosis of other hormone deficiencies. You and your insurance company are getting your money’s worth.

19. GH treatment will cost thousands of dollars a year If it doesn’t cost this, it’s not going to provide the benefit if you are deficient. If you are not deficient, you don’t need it. The brands of real GH are expensive products with high profit margins. Do you really think a company that devises an oral form that avoids the injections will market it for less?

GH products and uses

The following guide to GH, effective uses, questionable uses, GH quackery and fraud is divided into three sections: (1) a discussion of legitimate growth hormone products and proven uses, (2) questionable or unproven uses of real growth hormone, and (3) things that aren’t growth hormone. For some of these products and uses, quackery and scam are clearly not applicable. For others, these are absolutely accurate. The scams camouflage themselves in the references and language of the more legitimate. In the following tables, routes of administration include SQ (subcutaneous injection), oral (into the mouth by pill, liquid or spray), IV (intravenous), and nasal (spray into the nose). Indications is a medical term which describes the condition which a medication is intended to treat. Examples are some of the brand names of the products. Status refers to FDA approval for the indications listed and is approved (studies strongly demonstrating efficacy and safety submitted to the FDA and approved and available by prescription), experimental (studies to demonstrate efficacy underway or not submitted for FDA approval), investigational (only available in clinical trials for FDA approval), and alternative.

Table 1: Real GH or releaser, real uses

Type of product	Route	Examples	Indications	Status 1. real GH (recombinant human somatropin or somatrem)	SQ	Protropin, Nutropin, Humatrope, Genotropin, Norditropin, Saizen	Growth failure in children due to GH deficiency, renal failure, Turner syndrome. Prader-Willi syndrome (to improve growth and body composition). AIDS wasting and lipodystrophy. Adult growth hormone deficiency (to improve body composition, bone density, lipids, strength). Approved 2. GH releasing hormone	SQ	Geref	Growth failure in children due to certain types of GH deficiency	Approved

The first box lists the major brands of real GH used in the United States and the conditions for which most GH is prescribed. Evidence of significant benefit in these conditions is high enough to have obtained FDA approval and (usually) insurance coverage. GH in these conditions can have benefits that approach the miraculous. Note that all of these products require prescription, daily to monthly subcutaneous injection, and cost roughly $2000 to $40,000 a year, depending on dose needed. Side effects (listed above, note 4) are uncommon when GH is given in replacement doses to people who are deficient. Geref is a true growth hormone “releaser,” but offers little advantage over GH in cost or method of administration.

Table 2: Real GH or related substances, but questionable, unproven, or experimental uses

Type of product	Route	Examples	Indications	Status 1. real GH (recombinant human somatropin)	SQ	Protropin, Nutropin, Humatrope, Genotropin, Norditropin, Saizen	Growth failure not due to GH deficiency or the other approved categories. Fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue. Burns, wound healing. Preserving lean body mass during wt loss. Protecting muscle and bone during high dose steroid use Rare types of heart failure	Experimtl 2. real GH (recombinant human somatropin)	SQ	Most of above brands	Enhancing muscle strength and athletic performance. Reversing physical changes of aging in older people without GH deficiency	Experimtl in healthy people 3. GH-releasing agents (hexarelin, ghrelin, GHRP-2, GHRP-6, MK-677)	Oral, IV, SQ	investigat	Growth failure, GH deficiency; other conditions for which GH-type effects might be beneficial	Investigat 4. IGF-1	SQ	investigat	Certain types of growth failure, as an insulin adjunct in diabetes	Investigat 5. IGF1/IGFBP3	SQ	investigat		Investigat

GH has been tried experimentally in dozens of clinical conditions in addition to those approved by the FDA. The products, costs, and potential side effects in groups 1 and 2 are nearly the same as in Table 1, but the benefits for these conditions are inconsistent, smaller, or insufficienctly proven. In a few instances, full FDA approval has not been sought because there are two few patients with the condition to make the rigorous qualifying trials profitable (although doctors can still prescribe for those conditions). Two controversial uses are grouped in row 2, because most of the instances of this type of use are not occurring in a true experimental context. Athletic use is actually illegal and forbidden by Olympic and NCAA rules of competition although occasionally you can see advertisements in the bodybuilding magazines for GH prescriptions by phone or mail without testing. Real GH is expensive and hard to come by legally, which makes people willing to use it for athletic or body building the targets of a variety of scams. Will taking real GH increase your strength, your size or your athletic performance if you aren’t deficient? I suspect the answer is “not much.” Is it safe? The risk of side effects is likely to increase as the dose increases for people not deficient. I have not seen any good studies measuring benefits of GH use for athletes or bodybuilders, and there is nothing at all in the way of tracking for long-term side effects. A recent issue of Baillere’s Clinics in Endocrinology and Metabolism on Doping in Sports had an excellent review of this issue; unfortunately it is not available online. There is even more interest in GH as an anti-aging hormone than for athletic enhancement. There are doctors who prescribe, and people who take, injectable GH for its anti-aging effects. If you are reading this because of an interest in this use, see below for a more extensive discussion. Real GH releasers (not amino acids) and real IGF-1 are still in the stage of clinical investigation, and may or may not prove effective enough to be approved, marketed, and prescribed. You can read more about GH releasers at http://ips1.lwwonline.com/servlet/GetFileServlet?J=1840&I=3&A=11&U=1&T=1 There are hundreds of papers accessible through Medline on experimental uses of synthetic IGF-1.

Table 3. Products not to be confused with real GH Product	Route of administr	Why it isn’t equivalent to real GH Amino acids or protein sold as “Precursors”	Oral pills, drops, sprays	As explained above, amino acids are the building blocks of all the proteins in the body. A tiny fraction (about 1 amino acid of every 100,000 molecules) you eat will be incorporated into GH. For people getting plenty of dietary protein, eating a few more grams or even ounces a day will NOT measurably increase the amount of GH you make. Amino acids or protein sold as “Releasers”	Oral pills, drops, sprays	A meal of protein without accompanying carbohydrates will often stimulate the pituitary gland to release GH, raising a person’s GH levels for a few minutes. The effect is too transient to be successfully used to treat GH deficiency. I promise you that the peptide GH releasers being researched by pharmaceutical laboratories will NOT be marketed as oral dietary supplements by mall vitamin stores or MLM schemes. Homeopathic growth hormone	Any	The 20X or 50C homeopathic medicines are truly the emperor’s new clothes of alternative medicine. If you think that even one GH receptor in your body is going to see a functional GH molecule from these products, you are too stupid to be allowed to spend money. Herbal preparations	Any	Herbal means anything, but usually it means this company did not have enough confidence in its product to subject it to either (1) the research trials which would prove that it will act like GH, or (2) the FDA standards that give you the best assurance that the product contains what the label says. Remember, they know more about what’s in it than you do. IGF-1	Drops, pills, sprays	Whatever this is, if it isn’t an expensive injection obtained in an FDA-approved research protocol, it does not contain enough real and usable insulin-like growth factor 1 to provide any measurable benefit to your body. Counterfeits	Inject	Apparently there are vials of something with counterfeit GH labels being sold on the internet, or in Mexican pharmacies.

Table 3 lists alternative, “not-quite,” “not even close,” or downright dishonest products that are not effective forms or amounts of growth hormone, no matter what they’re called. The alternative category refers to formulations and products made by companies that do not conduct research of the quality needed for FDA approval, have no intention of seeking FDA approval, and usually warn the consumer that their product is not intended to treat disease. The failings of nearly all are explained in the notes above and the table. Products in Table 3 are usually marketed in misleading ways, although if you learn to read the fine print, they may be perfectly honest in their labeling. They are generally not intended for use by real physicians treating real people with real deficiency of growth hormone. Is that plain enough? I am not naming brand names for several reasons. Websites, email spam and brand names come and go in an endless variation on the types listed above. If you do an internet search on HGH you will score dozens examples of these products. For instance, a single site that lists many HGH products is:  http://www.worldhealth.net/hgh.html

Finally, I’m not interested in inviting nuisance lawsuits by offended companies. If you sell a GH product, I’m sure yours is a legitimate exception to the descriptions above and you share my desire to see your fraudulent competitors discredited. Just send me the info and I’ll be happy to acknowledge that none of these descriptions applies to your product. The following is a fine example of a website that is willing to explain just what’s wrong with all the competing products:  http://www.hgh.ws/ I couldn’t have said it better myself.

So what about REAL growth hormone to keep you young? If you are going to read this section, note two things: First, the GH to which this discussion refers is Humatrope, Protropin, Nutropin, Genotropin, and the other expensive, injectable, recombinant DNA synthetic GH products made by the major pharmaceutical companies. Second, you must keep in mind the difference between real “adult GH deficiency,” and the diminished GH production of aging.

Adult GH deficiency refers to a persistent inability to produce as much GH as other healthy people of your age and sex. It is a fairly rare condition affecting less than 1 in a thousand people). In most cases it results from damage to the pituitary gland by a tumor, radiation, surgery, birth defect, stroke, or inflammation. Many of these people are deficient from childhood. It is usually diagnosed by demonstrating low levels of IGF1, and absence of a rise in the GH level of the blood when the person is given a drug to stimulate the pituitary to release GH. Adult GH deficiency can have a variety of effects when untreated, including diminished mental and physical energy and strength, poorer bone density, increased body fat and weaker muscles, increased levels of cholesterol and earlier atherosclerosis. Without treatment, many people with this condition die somewhat earlier than expected. Treatment with real GH reverses or improves many of these effects, although many adults with GH deficiency refuse to take GH because it is expensive, taken by injection, and the benefits are not always rapidly perceptible. Treatment of adult GH deficiency with GH is approved by the FDA, although insurance companies do not always cover it. A fuller description of adult growth hormone deficiency and its treatment can be found in any recent textbook of endocrinology, in numerous published reviews in medical journals, or at http://www.endocrinology.org/SFE/gh.htm

GH production naturally diminishes with age. Some people think that means that older adults are GH deficient and would benefit from treatment. Hormones are signals that regulate many functions and organ systems of the body. Amounts of most hormones produced each day change through life. Amounts of GH and testosterone produced each day by an infant are different than the amounts produced by an adolescent. Amounts produced by a young adult are different than amounts produced by an older adult. The greatest amount of GH is produced during the adolescent growth spurt. The amount produced each day declines throughout adult life. Does this mean that healthy infants are GH or testosterone deficient and would benefit from treatment with additional GH or testosterone? Does this mean that healthy older adults are GH or testosterone deficient and would benefit from treatment? While the former question sounds (and is) silly, many people are tempted by the second. Here are the basic arguments pro and con. Pro 1. As adults age they make less GH than when they were younger. 2. As adults age their bodies change in ways that also occur in adults with untreated real GH deficiency. Muscle and bone mass and strength are reduced. The proportion of body fat often increases. Energy and drive often diminish. Blood vessels often become narrowed, especially if cholesterol levels are higher than average. 3. GH replacement safely improves all these problems in severely GH deficient adults. 4. Therefore, GH treatment should safely improve these things in “normal” adults as it does in severely deficient adults. Con 1. Too much or too little of all hormones, including GH, can cause problems. 2. In general, the likelihood of benefit from taking a hormone is much higher when one is severely deficient compared to most people of one’s age and sex. 3. There is usually little or no benefit when a person who already has normal amounts of a hormone takes extra. 4. In general, the likelihood of unwanted effects is higher when a person who is not deficient takes extra hormone. 5. Many hormones are produced in higher amounts in certain periods of life. This does not mean that people are “deficient” during the other times of life 6. There are many causes of extra body fat, weaker muscles, poorer bone density, blood vessel disease, fatigability, and lack of “drive” which are far more common than GH deficiency, testosterone deficiency, or thyroid deficiency. 7. Therefore, there is no reason to think most adults who would benefit from extra hormone.

Although

Glossary physiology Changes with aging The paradox of adult treatment GH and cancer Messing with mother nature

homeopathic great site telling how all the others are misleading http://www.qualitycounts.com/fpgrowthhormone.html page with instructions on getting gh in Tijuana, description of fake gh from china, gh scams by mail, links to Dr Cranston, mention of counterfeit gh, and links to good drug descriptions of costs etc

also an endo soc summary of adult gh def and rx ____

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Sainsbury's Bank

Sainsbury's Bank plc is a British bank wholly owned by Sainsbury's. The bank began trading on 19 February 1997 as a joint venture between Sainsbury's and Bank of Scotland. Sainsbury's took full ownership of the bank in January 2014.

The bank's head office is located in Edinburgh, Scotland, and its registered office in London, England. In 2017 it had over 2.1 million active customers.

History
Sainsbury's and Bank of Scotland (later a subsidiary of Lloyds Banking Group) formed the bank as a joint venture, and it received a full banking licence from the Bank of England in January 1997. It launched on 19 February 1997.

On 8 May 2013, Sainsbury's announced it would buy the 50% share in the business owned by Lloyds Banking Group. The transfer was completed on 31 January 2014, and Sainsbury's Bank became a wholly owned subsidiary of Sainsbury's.

In January 2024, Sainsbury’s announced its intention to phase out its banking division. In June 2024, it was announced the credit cards, loans and savings accounts had been acquired by NatWest in a deal due for completion by March 2025. The Sainsbury's Bank brand, its cash machines, insurance and travel money businesses were not included.

Services
The bank provides a range of financial products including travel money, insurance, credit cards, savings and loans, having withdrawn from the mortgage market in 2019. It is authorised by the Prudential Regulation Authority and regulated by both the Financial Conduct Authority and the Prudential Regulation Authority. Sainsbury's Bank products are linked to the Nectar reward scheme and can be applied for online or by telephone.

Finances
In the 2019-20 financial year, the bank had an income of £323 million, customer deposits of £6.3 billion, and total assets of £9.4 billion.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Sainsbury's Bank


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Econophysics

Econophysics is a non-orthodox (in economics) interdisciplinary research field, applying theories and methods originally developed by physicists in order to solve problems in economics, usually those including uncertainty or stochastic processes and nonlinear dynamics. Some of its application to the study of financial markets has also been termed statistical finance referring to its roots in statistical physics. Econophysics is closely related to social physics.

History
Physicists' interest in the social sciences is not new (see e.g., ); Daniel Bernoulli, as an example, was the originator of utility-based preferences. One of the founders of neoclassical economic theory, former Yale University Professor of Economics Irving Fisher, was originally trained under the renowned Yale physicist, Josiah Willard Gibbs. Likewise, Jan Tinbergen, who won the first Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1969 for having developed and applied dynamic models for the analysis of economic processes, studied physics with Paul Ehrenfest at Leiden University. In particular, Tinbergen developed the gravity model of international trade that has become the workhorse of international economics.

Econophysics was started in the mid-1990s by several physicists working in the subfield of statistical mechanics. Unsatisfied with the traditional explanations and approaches of economists – which usually prioritized simplified approaches for the sake of soluble theoretical models over agreement with empirical data – they applied tools and methods from physics, first to try to match financial data sets, and then to explain more general economic phenomena.

One driving force behind econophysics arising at this time was the sudden availability of large amounts of financial data, starting in the 1980s. It became apparent that traditional methods of analysis were insufficient – standard economic methods dealt with homogeneous agents and equilibrium, while many of the more interesting phenomena in financial markets fundamentally depended on heterogeneous agents and far-from-equilibrium situations.

The term "econophysics" was coined by H. Eugene Stanley, to describe the large number of papers written by physicists in the problems of (stock and other) markets, in a conference on statistical physics in Kolkata (erstwhile Calcutta) in 1995 and first appeared in its proceedings publication in Physica A 1996. The inaugural meeting on econophysics was organised in 1998 in Budapest by János Kertész and Imre Kondor. The first book on econophysics was by R. N. Mantegna & H. E. Stanley in 2000.

The almost regular meeting series on the topic include: ECONOPHYS-KOLKATA (held in Kolkata & Delhi), Econophysics Colloquium, ESHIA/ WEHIA.

In recent years network science, heavily reliant on analogies from statistical mechanics, has been applied to the study of productive systems. That is the case with the works done at the Santa Fe Institute in European Funded Research Projects as Forecasting Financial Crises and the Harvard-MIT Observatory of Economic Complexity

If "econophysics" is taken to denote the principle of applying statistical mechanics to economic analysis, as opposed to a particular literature or network, priority of innovation is probably due to Emmanuel Farjoun and Moshé Machover (1983). Their book Laws of Chaos: A Probabilistic Approach to Political Economy proposes dissolving (their words) the transformation problem in Marx's political economy by re-conceptualising the relevant quantities as random variables.

If, on the other hand, "econophysics" is taken to denote the application of physics to economics, one can consider the works of Léon Walras and Vilfredo Pareto as part of it. Indeed, as shown by Bruna Ingrao and Giorgio Israel, general equilibrium theory in economics is based on the physical concept of mechanical equilibrium.

Econophysics has nothing to do with the "physical quantities approach" to economics, advocated by Ian Steedman and others associated with neo-Ricardianism. Notable econophysicists are Emmanuel Bacry, Giulio Bottazzi, Jean-Philippe Bouchaud, Bikas K Chakrabarti, J. Doyne Farmer, Diego Garlaschelli, Dirk Helbing, János Kertész,  Fabrizio Lillo, Rosario N. Mantegna, Matteo Marsili, Joseph L. McCauley, Jean-Francois Muzy, Enrico Scalas, Angelo Secchi, Didier Sornette, H. Eugene Stanley, Victor Yakovenko and Yi-Cheng Zhang. Particularly noteworthy among the formal courses on econophysics is the one offered continuously for more than a decade by Diego Garlaschelli at the Physics Department of the Leiden University.

Basic tools
Basic tools of econophysics are probabilistic and statistical methods often taken from statistical physics.

Physics models that have been applied in economics include the kinetic theory of gas (called the kinetic exchange models of markets ), percolation models, chaotic models developed to study cardiac arrest, and models with self-organizing criticality as well as other models developed for earthquake prediction. Moreover, there have been attempts to use the mathematical theory of complexity and information theory, as developed by many scientists among whom are Murray Gell-Mann and Claude E. Shannon, respectively.

For potential games, it has been shown that an emergence-producing equilibrium based on information via Shannon information entropy produces the same equilibrium measure (Gibbs measure from statistical mechanics) as a stochastic dynamical equation which represents noisy decisions, both of which are based on bounded rationality models used by economists. The fluctuation-dissipation theorem connects the two to establish a concrete correspondence of "temperature", "entropy", "free potential/energy", and other physics notions to an economics system. The statistical mechanics model is not constructed a-priori - it is a result of a boundedly rational assumption and modeling on existing neoclassical models. It has been used to prove the "inevitability of collusion" result of Huw Dixon in a case for which the neoclassical version of the model does not predict collusion. Here the demand is increasing, as with Veblen goods, stock buyers with the "hot hand" fallacy preferring to buy more successful stocks and sell those that are less successful, or among short traders during a short squeeze as occurred with the WallStreetBets group's collusion to drive up GameStop stock price in 2021. Nobel laureate and founder of experimental economics Vernon L. Smith has used econophysics to model sociability via implementation of ideas in Humanomics. There, noisy decision making and interaction parameters that facilitate the social action responses of reward and punishment result in spin glass models identical to those in physics.

Quantifiers derived from information theory were used in several papers by econophysicist Aurelio F. Bariviera and coauthors in order to assess the degree in the informational efficiency of stock markets. Zunino et al. use an innovative statistical tool in the financial literature: the complexity-entropy causality plane. This Cartesian representation establish an efficiency ranking of different markets and distinguish different bond market dynamics. It was found that more developed countries have stock markets with higher entropy and lower complexity, while those markets from emerging countries have lower entropy and higher complexity. Moreover, the authors conclude that the classification derived from the complexity-entropy causality plane is consistent with the qualifications assigned by major rating companies to the sovereign instruments. A similar study developed by Bariviera et al. explore the relationship between credit ratings and informational efficiency of a sample of corporate bonds of US oil and energy companies using also the complexity–entropy causality plane. They find that this classification agrees with the credit ratings assigned by Moody's.

Another good example is random matrix theory, which can be used to identify the noise in financial correlation matrices. One paper has argued that this technique can improve the performance of portfolios, e.g., in applied in portfolio optimization.

The ideology of econophysics is embodied in a new probabilistic economic theory and, on its basis, a unified theory of stock markets.

There are also analogies between finance theory and diffusion theory. For instance, the Black–Scholes equation for option pricing is a diffusion-advection equation (see however for a critique of the Black–Scholes methodology). The Black–Scholes theory can be extended to provide an analytical theory of main factors in economic activities.

Subfields
Various other tools from physics that have so far been used, such as fluid dynamics, classical mechanics and quantum mechanics (including so-called classical economy, quantum economics and quantum finance), and the Feynman–Kac formula of statistical mechanics.

Statistical mechanics
When mathematician Mark Kac attended a lecture by Richard Feynman he realized their work overlapped. Together they worked out a new approach to solving stochastic differential equations. Their approach is used to efficiently calculate solutions to the Black–Scholes equation to price options on stocks.

Quantum finance
Quantum statistical models have been successfully applied to finance by several groups of econophysicists using different approaches, but the origin of their success may not be due to quantum analogies.

Quantum economics
The editorial in the inaugural issue of the journal Quantum Economics and Finance says: "Quantum economics and finance is the application of probability based on projective geometry—also known as quantum probability—to modelling in economics and finance. It draws on related areas such as quantum cognition, quantum game theory, quantum computing, and quantum physics." In his overview article in the same issue, David Orrell outlines how neoclassical economics benefited from the concepts of classical mechanics, and yet concepts of quantum mechanics "apparently left economics untouched". He reviews different avenues for quantum economics, some of which he notes are contradictory, settling on "quantum economics therefore needs to take a different kind of leaf from the book of quantum physics, by adopting quantum methods, not because they appear natural or elegant or come pre-approved by some higher authority or bear resemblance to something else, but because they capture in a useful way the most basic properties of what is being studied."

Main results
Econophysics is having some impacts on the more applied field of quantitative finance, whose scope and aims significantly differ from those of economic theory. Various econophysicists have introduced models for price fluctuations in physics of financial markets or original points of view on established models.

Presently, one of the main results of econophysics comprises the explanation of the "fat tails" in the distribution of many kinds of financial data as a universal self-similar scaling property (i.e. scale invariant over many orders of magnitude in the data), arising from the tendency of individual market competitors, or of aggregates of them, to exploit systematically and optimally the prevailing "microtrends" (e.g., rising or falling prices). These "fat tails" are not only mathematically important, because they comprise the risks, which may be on the one hand, very small such that one may tend to neglect them, but which - on the other hand - are not negligible at all, i.e. they can never be made exponentially tiny, but instead follow a measurable algebraically decreasing power law, for example with a failure probability of only $$P\propto x^{-4}\,,$$ where x is an increasingly large variable  in the tail region of the distribution considered (i.e. a price statistics with much more than 108 data). I.e., the events considered are not simply "outliers" but must really be taken into account and cannot be "insured away". It appears that it also plays a role that near a change of the tendency (e.g. from falling to rising prices) there are typical "panic reactions" of the selling or buying agents with algebraically increasing bargain rapidities and volumes.

As in quantum field theory the "fat tails" can be obtained by complicated "nonperturbative" methods, mainly by numerical ones, since they contain the deviations from the usual Gaussian approximations, e.g. the Black–Scholes theory. Fat tails can, however, also be due to other phenomena, such as a random number of terms in the central-limit theorem, or any number of other, non-econophysics models. Due to the difficulty in testing such models, they have received less attention in traditional economic analysis.

Criticism
In 2006 economists Mauro Gallegati, Steve Keen, Thomas Lux, and Paul Ormerod, published a critique of econophysics. They cite important empirical contributions primarily in the areas of finance and industrial economics, but list four concerns with work in the field: lack of awareness of economics work, resistance to rigor, a misplaced belief in universal empirical regularity, and inappropriate models.

Lectures

 * Economic Fluctuations and Statistical Physics: Quantifying Extremely Rare and Much Less Rare Events, Eugene Stanley, Videolectures.net
 * Applications of Statistical Physics to Understanding Complex Systems, Eugene Stanley, Videolectures.net
 * Financial Bubbles, Real Estate Bubbles, Derivative Bubbles, and the Financial and Economic Crisis, Didier Sornette, Videolectures.net
 * Financial crises and risk management, Didier Sornette, Videolectures.net
 * Bubble trouble: how physics can quantify stock-market crashes, Tobias Preis, Physics World Online Lecture Series

title: Econophysics


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Queen Margaret Union

The Queen Margaret Union (QMU) is one of two students' unions at the University of Glasgow, Scotland. Founded in 1890, it caters to the social and cultural needs of its members by providing a range of services including volunteering opportunities, entertainment, catering, bars and games.

History
The Queen Margaret Union was founded in 1890 by students of the Queen Margaret College, both named after Saint Margaret of Scotland, a Queen Consort of Scotland, in the West End of Glasgow to provide an outlet for their social and cultural needs.

The QMU operated in the basement rooms of the college until 1906, when the expansion of the college meant that the space was needed for teaching. A bazaar was held by the Board of Management (comprising elected students) to raise money to erect and furnish a union building to house the Union. The bazaar was held over four days and featured a number of stalls selling many different items from clothes to pieces of furniture. Although the funds were raised, a building was never created for the Union to occupy.

After a few years of trying to decide how best to spend the money, a house at 31 Buckingham Terrace was rented. In 1912, the College Club at the University of Glasgow went into liquidation and the QMU took over the premises at 67 Ann Street (now Southpark Terrance) until 1922 when it moved across the road from the Glasgow University Union (GUU, which only admitted men) in the John McIntyre Building, to be based at 1 University Gardens (left, now part of the Department of History). During this period, the QM Union mostly provided space for its members to study, discuss, debate and eat.

In 1932, as the Men's Union grew in size and had a building built at the bottom of Gilmorehill, its previous home in the John McIntyre Building was given to the QM Union. At this time in its history the QMU was beginning to explore, rather successfully, in the world of university debating. Men and other delegates were allowed to attend but only as "distinguished strangers", who sat in a separate gallery. Other facilities included a library, dining room, study space, and cubicles so that members who lived at home outwith the city centre could stay over after public transport had ended.

The building became inadequate to provide for the University of Glasgow's growing female population. In 1968, a building at 22 University Gardens was built to accommodate the then so-called, "Q-Emma’s". The women of the QMU were often involved in the debating circuit and especially in Rectorial elections and campaigns at the university.

However, the division of the sexes at Glasgow became more questioned with the passing of the Sex Discrimination Act 1975. The two unions had an agreement allowing reciprocal use of much of each other's facilities, but the QMU allowed men to use the bulk of its facilities with a few restrictions, while the GUU confined women only to its extension. As the 1970s came to a close, several men had requested to join the QMU. Consequently, it held a general meeting in 1979 and changed its constitution to allow men to become members. The GUU allowed women members one year later. Over 99% of the huge attendance at that EGM accepted the amendment.

A fire in 1982 shut the building for several months and sparked nearly a decade of financial problems for the Union. However, between 1989 and 1992, effective management and prudent financial control saw the Union become financially solvent once again.

Modern day
The early 1990s saw the QMU stage Nirvana, Soundgarden, Smashing Pumpkins, Hole, Garbage and Belle & Sebastian. This continued with bands such as Coldplay, Biffy Clyro and Franz Ferdinand playing on the same stage in the 2000s. And in 2016, Troye Sivan performed at the venue marking his first visit to Scotland on his blue neighbourhood tour.

The late 1990s until the early 2000s saw the QMU redevelop many of its social and commercial areas, including all of its bars. Other recent notable events at the QMU have included supporting Charles Kennedy in his successful campaign to become Rector.

In 2007 and 2009,, the QMU's member-run fortnightly publication, won the Best Magazine Award at The Herald Scottish Student Press Awards. It was shortlisted in 2006, 2008 and 2010. In 2010 Ruaraidh J MacIntyre, 's resident columnist won the 'Best Columnist' award at the Herald Student Press Awards.

The Union was again faced with financial difficulty in the 2000s as a result of the University of Glasgow cutting the block grant – the money annually supplied to both unions - by around half. This, exacerbated by the Financial crisis of 2007–08, meant the Union saw several consecutive years of financial loss. Responding to these financial difficulties, work by successive boards of management to engage with University management led to parity of funding with the Glasgow University Union for the first time in 2010 and the subsequent reinstatement of the block grant in 2011. However, many changes in the tastes, lifestyles and expectations of students have left the Queen Margaret Union - and many other student unions - facing severe problems.

During the coronavirus pandemic in 2020, the Union came under criticism from a trade union and the University Rector for making 31 members of part-time staff unemployed. The decision was made prior the Government announcing the furlough scheme, which led to the Board of Management voting to reinstate staff until the end of their contracts.

Relationship with other student organisations
There are two Unions at the University of Glasgow with some students choosing to join both of them during, and after, Freshers' week. In 2003–2004, both Unions attempted to change their Constitutions to allow for Automatic Joint Student Membership.

The University of Glasgow is not affiliated to the National Union of Students (NUS), with the QMU instead being part of Northern Services, a purchasing consortium set up by the students unions of Edinburgh. In 2006, a referendum was held to ask the students of the university whether it should affiliate with the NUS, during which the QMU formed part of the "No to NUS" campaign.

Board of Management
The QMU is run by a student Board of Management bi-annually elected by the membership. The names of the Presidents of the Union are preserved on a board in the main stairwell of the Union and photographs of each entire Board of Management are taken at the start of their term of office and displayed on the walls of the Board Room.

The Board is divided into three distinct parts. The Executive comprises the offices of President, and two Vice Presidents (Vice President: Membership, Clubs and Societies and Vice President: Board of Management) and are charged with the day-to-day running of the union and maintaining a high level of discipline, member and clubs and societies involvement and representing the union externally. They oversee every event, operation and campaign within the Union, and also act as trustees.

The Convenors are each responsible for an aspect of the unions' activity. The convenors are Campaigns and Charities Convenor, Events Convenor, Publications Convenor, Social Convenor, Tech Convenor and Mental Health and Welfare Convenor. They each chair a committee of Union members, as described below.

The largest section of the board is that of the Current Student Representatives. The 'CSR Committee' is composed of twelve elected students, at least three of whom are in their first year of study, who are largely free to involve themselves with whatever aspects of the union they see fit. A Convenor of Current Student Representatives (CCSR) is elected from amongst them to represent the committee as a whole to the Executive and Convenors.

In addition to this, the Board of Management contains two Former Student Members, the Past President, Honorary President and two Honorary Vice Presidents.

Committees
The Board of Management is fed ideas through a committee structure. Committee meetings can be attended by any member of the Union, and active committees in 2022 are:

Events: The Events Committee assist the planning and running of all QM-run events that take place in the Union.

Tech Team: The Tech Team are involved with the practicalities of running the QM's events, including lighting and sound tech.

Social: The Social Committee are concerned with the planning and execution of the (almost-daily) events that take place every day in Bar - one of the Union's three bars - from pub quizzes and acoustic nights to comedy and new theatre drawn from the students of the University of Glasgow.

Publications: The Publications Committee are responsible for all Union publications, namely the production and distribution of qmunicate magazine, the Union's in-house news and views magazine.

Campaigns & Charities: The C&C Committee oversee all Union fundraising and campaigns. Fundraising for local, national and international charities and campaigning for wider causes has been an integral part of the Queen Margaret Union for many years.

Mental Health & Welfare: The Mental Health and Welfare Committee are involved in planning events and campaigns to help with students mental health such as de-stress days.

Facilities
The QMU offers a number of facilities over four floors. Aside from general facilities, the Union's facilities include:

Ground floor

 * Venue: the Union's primary venue is used to host club nights and gigs, with a capacity of approximately 900. Amongst the most famous bands to have played there on their way to making it big are Queen (15 March 1974), Red Hot Chili Peppers (3 February 1990) and Nirvana (30 November 1991), as have other more recent bands such as Biffy Clyro. It has also been used for large pub quizzes, and for shows organised by affiliated clubs and societies.
 * Soundbite Takeaway
 * Cafe: serving hot and cold food suitable for snacks and lunches.
 * Accessible toilets

First floor

 * Bar: Many small Union events are run in Bar, including the Big Wednesday Night Pub Quiz (described by NME as the best in Glasgow).
 * Games: the QMU's sports bar, complete with pool tables.

Second Floor

 * StrEat Bites: A restaurant serving tapas-style street food from around the world.
 * Soundbite Restaurant: A restaurant serving Asian fusion style cuisine.

Third floor

 * The Executive office
 * The Boardroom
 * Committee rooms
 * Laundry facilities
 * TV room
 * Administrative offices
 * Gender neutral toilets

Archives
The archives of the QMU are maintained by the Archives of the University of Glasgow (GUAS).

title: Queen Margaret Union