Development of Glucocorticoid-Induced and Exercise-Caused Myopathies

The aim of this short review is to analyze the pathogenic factors induce glucocorticoid and exercise myopathies and to show whether exercise myopathy is the mild form of glucocorticoid myopathy as was hypothesized by prof. Lehmann about two decades ago. These pathogenic factors are high level of blood corticosteroids, structural changes in skeletal muscle fi bers, decreased protein synthesis and increased degradation rate, slow turnover rate of contractile proteins and slow regeneration of muscle tissue due to the decrease in the number of satellite cells under the basal lamina of muscle fi bers. Despite of apparent similarity in the destruction process of the myofi brillar apparatus, the development of these myopathies are different.