The test that detected three drugs in the blood of the 15-year-old Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva raises questions of why she or any athlete would take the substances.
Valieva said she took the drugs to treat a heart ailment, but cardiologists said that two of those drugs are not regularly used in cardiology, and the third, the banned drug trimetazidine, is used in Europe only for patients whose coronary arteries are narrowed and who have no other options. Even then, it is weakly effective at best.
Trimetazidine, a metabolic enhancer, encourages the heart to use glucose rather than fatty acids for fuel.