Every day, dr. Mintz and many of his patients inject themselves with steroids and hormones that would get ball players banned. Any adverse effects from any of this . None. What have been the benefits that youve felt . Well, energy. Better body composition. My brain function, we tested, is actually quicker than it was five to six years ago. And there are plenty of patients eager to follow the trail hes blazing. The ones we talked to in las vegas consider this a lifestyle choice, and theyre prepared to roll the dice. You could get killed in the interstate tomorrow. Every physician thats out there using it is seeing results theyve never seen before. Terren peizer is selling hope to the desperate. He claims to have a revolutionary drug therapy for addiction that breaks the grip of methamphetamine, cocaine, and alcohol. Dave smart was a meth addict for 20 years. He took peizers treatment one time. The cravings . The cravings were gone. What do you mean . You mean overnight . I mean overnight. Thats the way it worked for me. [jingly thai music] thailand an exotic Vacation Land known for its buddhas, its beaches, its brothels. But how about going for hip surgery or a multiple bypass or a facelift . A growing number of americans are doing just that, combining holidays with healthcare. This uninsured louisiana man had a complicated quintuple bypass. This woman from bend, oregon, a bit of an eye lift. It was just beyond my expectations. Welcome to 60 minutes on cnbc. Im steve kroft. In this episode, well look at people who market medical procedures as business ventures, everything from antiaging treatments to a protocol that claims to end addiction. Well begin with doctors and pharmacists who are catering to the 78 million aging baby boomers who want to slow that aging process down or to even turn back the clock. The treatments usually include doses of the same performanceenhancing drugs that are now banned by most professional sports things like testosterone, dhea, and Human Growth Hormone. As we first reported in 2006, all of this his highly controversial and possibly even illegal, but thats not stopping thousands of doctors from taking up the practice or patients from seeking them out. This is the temple of antiaging medicine, the Cenegenics Medical Institute of las vegas, nevada. Lets take a look at it. It was founded in 1998 by its chief prophet, dr. Alan mintz, who claims to have 12,000 patients around the world, offering hope to anyone who is feeling tired, getting flabby, and losing interest in sex. People are looking to feel better. Theyre tired of the answers, go home; we cant do anything for you; youre really okay. Theyre tired of hearing, im getting old; theres nothing you can do about it; just live with it. People have been chasing the fountain of youth for a long time. Not chasing the fountain of youth. This is not about the fountain of youth. This is not about staying forever young. Its about staying in charge of my life and being productive. Dr. Mintz is 68 years old, a longtime body builder and fitness freak who prescribes a regimen of regular exercise, good nutrition, along with vitamins and supplements to manage the effects of aging. Here comes the controversial part. Every day, dr. Mintz and many of his patients inject themselves with steroids and hormones that would get ball players banned and are considered by many to be downright dangerous. How many years have you been on Human Growth Hormone . I would say probably 10 or 11. Any adverse effects from any of this . None. Because im taking very small doses. What have been the benefits that youve felt . Well, energy. More energy. Better body composition. My brain is working. My brain function, we tested, is actually quicker than it was five to six years ago. Dr. Mintz say substances like testosterone and Human Growth Hormone are produced and stored by the human body. But as we get older, these natural levels taper off, creating what mintz claims are hormone deficiencies that may be responsible for some of the symptoms attributed to old age. We start to lose hormonal a lot of different hormones starting at 30, 2 to 3 a year. And by the time youre 40, you begin to recognize some changes. And we take it as, were just getting older. Youre trying to replenish. Were trying to replenish, right, but always within the limit of whats considered normal. Dr. Mintz says that testosterone and Human Growth Hormone help build muscle mass, reduce body fat, and strengthen bones against osteoporosis. And his patients say they can feel the difference. The real benefit of it more than anything else is the energy level. I mean, theres a difference between being 25 and 45, and i feel like im 25 again. We talked to a group of six of them that ranged in age from 74 to 34 a businessman, a cocktail waitress, a retired school teacher, a car dealership manager, a real estate broker, and a Human Resources consultant. Well take out some air. Theyre all injecting themselves with Human Growth Hormone, and some are also taking testosterone, dhea, and estrogen. You feel younger . Well, im 74 and i worked out two hours last night and ive recovered. And i can stay up till midnight. And i have the energy and vitality. Big time libido. Yeah, like when youre a kid again. You know, for women improves your sex drive . Absolutely. Oh, yeah. Are all of you exercising more . Oh, yes, yes. And all of you are eating better . Yeah. Its a whole way of life. But the hormones and stuff is like cheating. It makes it so much easier to do and it gives you a the results are so much quicker. I mean, theyre steroids, right . Well. Were making ourselves better athletes. Thats my answer. We have trained physicians around the country. Cenegenics has a network of more than 100 affiliated doctors in the United States and joint ventures in tokyo, seoul, and hong kong. Mintz says his roster of patients includes movie stars, las vegas entertainers, ceos, and the president of a foreign country, some of whom pay as much as 1,000 a month for the treatment. How much has your business grown . Well, start with zero nine years ago, and itll do 20 million this year. Thats a pretty good practice. Its a very good practice. And you dont have to worry about medicare or medicaid. We dont ever want to talk to medicare and medicaid. No insurance to deal with. Absolutely none. Its like the good old days. Like the good old days. When we return, some doctors question the cenegenic system. I would not take growth hormone because its unsafe. I would certainly not recommend to my family or my patients that they take growth hormone. On 60 minutes on cnbc. 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The academys reluctance may have had something to do with the presence of exhibitors pedaling Human Growth Hormone, which is a Prescription Drug with narrowly defined uses that is supposed to be strictly controlled. Just six weeks earlier, an article in the journal of the American Medical Association warned doctors and Healthcare Professionals that the distribution or marketing of growth hormone to treat aging or agingrelated conditions is illegal, punishable by up to five years in prison. But that didnt stop this pharmacist from marketing his companys own specially made growth hormone product to antiaging doctors. We called a few people, paid some money for an attorney to give us an opinion, and everybody said we couldnt do it, that we should do it and could not do it. Okay. So thats why we started doing it. I got you. The pharmacist told us that what he was doing was perfectly legal and that he never gives out growth hormone without a valid prescription from a doctor. According to the food and drug administration, there are very few approved uses for Human Growth Hormone. The most common is growth hormone deficiency, which is caused by disease or damage to the pituitary gland and is thought to afflict only three people out of every 10,000 adults. If thats true, a lot of them must have been at the antiaging convention. All of this is particularly alarming to doctor shlomo melmed, who literally wrote the book on Human Growth Hormone and says there are all sorts of good reasons why its use is supposed to be carefully controlled. I would not take growth hormone because its unsafe. And as a physician, i would certainly not recommend to my family or my patients that they take growth hormone, unless they have a proven indication for pituitary damage. Dr. Melmed, director of cedarssinai Research Institute in los angeles, is one of the worlds leading researchers on Human Growth Hormone and president of the International Society of endocrinology, which is the study of hormones. Theres no study published which shows the growth hormone administration will prolong life in a controlled fashion. There is no control study which shows that growth hormone administration in the long term will benefit any of the frailties of old age. Dr. Melmed says the benefits of taking testosterone and Human Growth Hormone are often temporary and largely cosmetic, while the potential side effects, which include joint pain, carpal tunnel syndrome, high blood pressure, diabetes, and heat failure are very real. But his biggest concern is that Human Growth Hormone could stimulate the growth of undetected cancer cells such as Prostate Cancer in men over 50. It may well be that its beneficial for us to have low growth hormones as we age. Why . It may be protecting us from cancer and heart disease. If someone has a latent cancer, is there any way to diagnose that before you begin administering Human Growth Hormone . Unfortunately not. I would be very reluctant to pour fuel onto the fire of a cancer by adding a very powerful growth factor. Does this bother you . Of course it bothers me. It bothers me that people are prepared to spend so much money on a molecule which may be unsafe for them. Hi. Dr. Mintz. Can i help you . Dr. Mintz at cenegenics is undeterred. He says his staff physicians monitor patients carefully and look out for signs of cancer. He also says hes giving Human Growth Hormone to only 7 of his patients, all of whom have natural levels below normal and symptoms that lead him to believe they are growth hormone deficient. If your labs show you that you have. He told he avoids using the term antiaging these days because he considers it misleading and unscientific. He provided us with stacks of studies supporting the promise of growth hormone and testosterone supplements, but acknowledged there were no longterm blind studies showing that they were safe or effective in age management. They dont exist . They dont exist. We dont really know scientifically. Galileo didnt have double blind studies, but observations wonderful. Weve never done a double blind study on the sun, but you know and i know even on a cloud day, its coming up every morning. Are you an endocrinologist . I am not. Im a radiologist. How many endocrinologists do you have on your staff . We have none practicing, but two on our board. But if its all about hormonal balance, you would think that you would have a Building Full of endocrinologists. Most endocrinologists deal with thyroid disease and diabetes. If you ask them, thats what theyll talk about. We have a diseasebased system. Theyre rewarded for disease. Its a major paradigm. Doctors cant get paid for health. So are you saying that the endocrinologists, the people who study hormones, dont understand it . Theyre not ready to get there yet. [car beeps] dr. Mintz considers himself a pioneer in this gray area of law and science, and there are plenty of patients eager to follow the trail hes blazing. The ones we talked to in las vegas, all eager to remain young and vital, consider this a lifestyle choice, and theyre prepared to roll the dice. You arent concerned that five years from now, somebody might do a study and find out that this regimen accelerates the growth of cancer cells or causes diabetes . Well, thats happened with prescriptive drugs. I mean, has it not . So this is any in any field youre doing this. Theyre taken drugs off the market because of this. So youd rather feel better now while youre living your life than worry about the possibly downside 10 or 15 years from now . You could get killed on the interstate tomorrow. I mean, my goodness. I mean, its you have to weigh risks and rewards. You do that every day in life. You do it when you get up in the morning. Are you sure, are you absolutely positive, absent any scientific studies, that the treatments that youre giving now wont prove to be detrimental to someones health five, 10, 15 years from now when all the evidence is in . If you talk about five, 10, 15 years, im pretty comfortable. No, im not absolutely sure. Only a fools absolutely sure. Am i confident . Do i sleep well at night . Yes. In 2007, about a year after we first reported this story, dr. Alan mintz died, reportedly from a brain hemorrhage. He was 69. Cenegenics however has continued to thrive, partly with the help of an eyecatching print and tv ad. And the market keeps on growing. One book in 2010 estimated that antiaging medicine in the u. S. Was an 88 billion industry. Next well look at a different cocktail of medications that may or may not bring relief to thousands of people, when 60 minutes on cnbc continues. Armers, we make you sr about insurance. Because what you dont know can hurt you. What if you didnt know that boxes by the curb. Make you a target for thieves . Or that dog bites account for a third of all home liability claims . What if you didnt know that one in seven drivers is uninsured . And that grease fires have to be smothered . The more you know, the better you can plan for whats ahead. Get smarter about your insurance. We are farmers bum pa dum, bum bum bum bum there are a lot of warning lights and sounds vying for your attention. So we invented a warning you can feel. Introducing the allnew cadillac xts. Available with a patented safety alert seat. When theres danger you might not see, youre warned by a pulse in the seat. Its technology you wont find in a mercedes eclass. The allnew cadillac xts has arrived, and its bringing the future forward. Ve always had to keep my eye on her. But, i didnt always watch out for myself. With so much noise about health care. I tuned it all out. With unitedhealthcare, i get information that matters. My individual health profile. Not random statistics. They even reward me for addressing my health risks. So im doing fine. But shes still going to give me a heart attack. Were more than 78,000 people looking out for more than 70 million americans. Thats health in numbers. Unitedhealthcare. Our next story is about a Therapy Program that promises to end drug addiction. Its called prometa, and its being sold to the public not by a doctor or a scientist, but by a former junk bonds salesman. As scott pelley first reported in 2007, Terren Peizer skipped the usual medical research and government approvals to rush prometa to the market. Why the shortcuts . Peizer, who stood to make millions, said there was no way he could sit on prometa when he believed it was the miracle treatment that millions of people were dying for. If you had a son, if you had a son or a daughter and maybe you do if hes strung out on meth and hes gonna kill himself, if you had the opportunity, and i said to you, will you treat your son with prometa, would you take that option for your son . Terren peizer is selling hope to the desperate. If what he says is true, hes hit on the first medical treatment for methamphetamine addiction, a therapy that he says works for cocaine and alcohol too. This is prometa being given to an alcoholic. With three visits to a clinic, he gets one drug by infusion and two more in the form of pills. The drugs have been around for years, but none of them was developed to treat addiction. Dave smart tried prometa. Hed been hooked on meth for 20 years. I tried n. A. I tried a. A. I tried inpatient treatment centers. I tried outpatient treatment centers. Ive been to jail and prison many times for different crimes due to meth. Youve got a wife of more than 20 years. Youve got children. Youve got grandchildren. None of that, none of that was worth quitting for . All of that is worth quitting for. But it has such a strong hold on me, did have such a strong hold on me, that i couldnt quit. In tacoma, washington, smart took us to see the damage meth can do. You tore this place apart . We tore this place apart. Addicts swarmed this unoccupied house like locusts, stripped it, and sold the scrap all the wiring we took out of there and all the aluminum, the wiring out of the house. You stole it and you sold it all . Thats the bottom line, yeah. You know, this is the kind of thing ive seen in baghdad. Really . People looting and stealing anything they can get their hands on. Yeah, thats what we do. Thats what we do to pay for our dope. Eight months ago, smart was on his way to buy dope when he stopped at a prometa clinic hed heard about on tv. After about an hour here, instead of going on to the meth dealer, he went home. The cravings . The cravings were gone. What do you mean . You mean overnight . I mean overnight. Thats the way it worked for me. Dave, you have to understand how that sounds too good to be true. I do understand how it sounds too good to be true. You never would have believed it. No. No, i never would have bel