Dosage research

BPC-157 Dosage: What Studies Have Actually Investigated

Scientifically reviewed by PepSource Research Team · last reviewed July 2026

There is no established or generally accepted BPC-157 dosage for use in humans. BPC-157 is not an approved medicine in the UK, EU or US, and the published human evidence is limited to a single small safety study plus a few registered clinical trials — one of which never reported results and one of which is still recruiting. The overwhelming majority of BPC-157 research is preclinical, carried out in rats, mice and cell cultures. This article documents the quantities actually used in that published research and in registered clinical trials, with citations, so you can see exactly what has been studied. It is not a dosing recommendation and does not describe a protocol, cycle or method of administration.

What is BPC-157?

BPC-157 (sometimes called “Body Protection Compound-157”) is a synthetic pentadecapeptide — a chain of 15 amino acids (sequence Gly-Glu-Pro-Pro-Pro-Gly-Lys-Pro-Ala-Asp-Asp-Ala-Gly-Leu-Val; molecular weight ≈ 1419). It is described in the literature as a stable fragment related to a protein found in gastric juice. In animal models it has been studied for effects on the healing of tissues such as tendon, muscle, ligament, gut and bone.1

Research and regulatory status. BPC-157 is an unapproved, investigational compound. It is not approved by the FDA or EMA for any use; in 2023 the US FDA placed it in Category 2 of its interim 503A “bulk drug substances” list, restricting US pharmacy compounding on safety-review grounds. The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) prohibits BPC-157 at all times under section S0 (unapproved substances). It is supplied by vendors, including PepSource, strictly as a research reagent for laboratory use.

Is there an established BPC-157 dosage?

No. To answer the “BPC-157 dosage” question honestly you have to separate several things that are often blurred together online:

  • Approved medical dosing — none exists. BPC-157 has not been approved by the MHRA, the EMA or the US FDA for any indication, and no marketing authorisation or New Drug Application has been granted. There is therefore no official, licensed dose.
  • Investigational clinical-trial protocols — a small number of human trials have been registered. These describe amounts a trial planned to investigate; a trial protocol is not an approved dose and not a recommendation.
  • Preclinical (animal) research — the bulk of the literature. Animal quantities are given per kilogram of body weight and cannot be translated into a human dose.

A 2025 systematic review in the HSS Journal screened 544 articles on BPC-157 for musculoskeletal use and found only one clinical study met its inclusion criteria — the remainder were animal studies — and concluded that the human evidence base is inadequate to support clinical recommendations.1

BPC-157 dosage investigated in human clinical research

Only a very small amount of human data exists, and only one study has actually been published with numbers. The table summarises what has been investigated; each study is described below.

Study Participants Quantity investigated Frequency Route Duration Outcome
Lee & Burgess, 2025 (safety pilot)2 2 healthy adults 10 mg, then 20 mg One infusion per day, 2 days Intravenous (in 250 cc saline, over 1 hour) 2 days Well tolerated; no measurable biomarker changes reported
NCT02637284, Phase 13 42 healthy volunteers (planned) 1, 3 or 6 mg (single dose; 1 mg per tablet) Single dose (Phase 1a) Oral tablet Status “unknown”; no results ever posted
NCT07437547, Phase 24 120 planned (grade II hamstring strain) Not stated in the registry Once daily Subcutaneous injection 14 days Recruiting — no results yet

Lee & Burgess (2025) is, at the time of writing, the only published human study reporting BPC-157 amounts. It was a two-person safety pilot: a 58-year-old man and a 68-year-old woman (both of whom had received intravenous BPC-157 before the study) were given a 10 mg intravenous infusion on day one and a 20 mg infusion on day two, each in 250 cc of saline over one hour. The authors reported no side effects and no measurable effects on markers of heart, liver, kidney, thyroid or blood-glucose function, concluding that intravenous infusion of up to 20 mg was well tolerated in these two adults.2 This is historical reporting of a single, very small study — not evidence of a safe or effective dose.

The Phase 1 trial (NCT02637284), sponsored by PharmaCotherapia d.o.o. and registered in 2015, planned to give 42 healthy volunteers aged 18–35 single oral doses of 1, 3 or 6 mg (tablets containing 1 mg each) against placebo, to assess safety and pharmacokinetics. Its status is listed as “unknown” and no results were ever published.3

The Phase 2 trial (NCT07437547), sponsored by Hudson Biotech and recruiting as of 2026, is a randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled study in 120 adults (18–45) with an MRI-confirmed grade II hamstring strain. Participants receive BPC-157 by subcutaneous injection once daily for 14 days versus placebo; the amount per injection is not stated in the public registry, and no results are available.4

An earlier programme referred to as PL-14736 studied BPC-157 for inflammatory bowel disease;5 however, a reliable quantitative protocol for that work could not be verified from a primary source for this article, so no figures are reported here.

Dose-escalation research

No completed, published human study has used a formal multi-arm dose-escalation design for BPC-157. The only escalation that appears anywhere in the human literature is within the two-person safety pilot, where the infused amount was increased from 10 mg on day one to 20 mg on day two.2 This describes the design of that single study; it is not a titration schedule for any reader.

Preclinical (animal and laboratory) research

Almost everything reported about BPC-157 comes from animal experiments, largely from one research group over roughly three decades.1 In these studies the compound is dosed per kilogram of body weight — a fundamentally different basis from the fixed milligram amounts used in the human work above.

As a representative example, Klicek and colleagues (2008) studied Wistar rats with surgically created colocutaneous fistulas and administered BPC-157 at 10 µg/kg and 10 ng/kg, once daily, either intraperitoneally or in drinking water; they reported accelerated closure of the defect.5 These two dose levels (10 µg/kg and 10 ng/kg), along with even smaller picogram-per-kilogram amounts and routes including intraperitoneal, intragastric/oral and topical application, recur throughout the preclinical BPC-157 literature.

Important: these are preclinical findings in animals and cannot be interpreted as establishing an equivalent human dosage. A weight-based amount that produced an effect in a rat does not convert into a human dose, and no such conversion is offered here.

What did different dosage groups show?

Animal studies: a striking feature of the preclinical literature is that widely different amounts — for instance 10 µg/kg versus 10 ng/kg, a thousand-fold difference — were often reported to produce comparable protective effects, rather than a clean dose-response curve.5 The 2025 systematic review likewise noted that effects were reported across a broad range of doses and models.1

Human studies: no dose-response conclusion can be drawn. The published human data involves only two participants at two amounts, which is far too small to compare groups.2 These observations are reported here as published; they are not a basis for selecting any amount.

Safety and adverse events reported in research

In the two-person intravenous pilot, no adverse events and no clinically meaningful biomarker changes were reported.2 The registered Phase 1 trial never reported safety results,3 and the Phase 2 trial is ongoing.4 Animal studies have generally described BPC-157 as well tolerated, but that is not controlled human safety data. The critical point is what is missing: there is no completed, controlled human trial establishing the safety of any amount, route or duration of BPC-157, and there is no long-term human safety data at all. BPC-157 is also prohibited in sport by WADA.

What the research does not tell us

  • No completed, randomised, placebo-controlled human efficacy trial has been published for any indication.1
  • Published human evidence amounts to two participants;2 a registered Phase 1 study reported nothing;3 a Phase 2 study is only now recruiting.4
  • The evidence base is overwhelmingly animal, and animal amounts are weight-based and non-transferable to humans.
  • There is no long-term human safety data, and no agreed “optimal” research parameters.
  • The 2025 systematic review concluded the human evidence is inadequate to support clinical recommendations.1

BPC-157 research timeline

  • 1990s–2010s — extensive preclinical work in rats and mice reports tissue-healing effects across a broad dose range (e.g. 10 µg/kg and 10 ng/kg).5
  • 2015 — a Phase 1 safety/pharmacokinetic trial in healthy volunteers is registered (NCT02637284); no results are ever posted.3
  • 2025 — a systematic review finds only one clinical study among 544 screened articles.1
  • 2025 — the first published human safety report — a two-person intravenous pilot (10 mg then 20 mg) — appears.2
  • 2026 — a randomised Phase 2 trial in hamstring strain begins recruiting (NCT07437547).4

Key takeaway

Searches for a “BPC-157 dosage” are looking for a number that, in humans, does not scientifically exist yet. There is no approved dose and no completed human efficacy trial. The only published human figures come from a two-person safety pilot (10 mg then 20 mg intravenously), a registered Phase 1 study that planned 1–6 mg oral doses but reported nothing, and a Phase 2 study now recruiting. Everything else is animal research, dosed per kilogram of body weight, which cannot be turned into a human dose. The honest, evidence-based answer is that the quantities above describe what researchers have investigated — not what anyone should take. For any health decision, consult a qualified medical professional.

Explore the underlying science: browse our published certificates of analysis and the PepSource research hub. Product reference: BPC-157 — supplied for laboratory research use only.

References

  1. Vasireddi N, Hahamyan H, Salata MJ, Karns M, Calcei JG, Voos JE, Apostolakos JM. Emerging Use of BPC-157 in Orthopaedic Sports Medicine: A Systematic Review. HSS Journal. 2025. DOI: 10.1177/15563316251355551.
  2. Lee E, Burgess K. Safety of Intravenous Infusion of BPC157 in Humans: A Pilot Study. Alternative Therapies in Health and Medicine. 2025 Sep;31(5):20–24. PubMed: PMID 40131143.
  3. PharmaCotherapia d.o.o. Phase I, Pilot Study in Healthy Volunteers, to Assess the Safety and Pharmacokinetics of PCO-02 (active ingredient BPC-157). ClinicalTrials.gov: NCT02637284 (registered 2015; status unknown).
  4. Hudson Biotech. A Randomized, Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled Phase 2 Trial of Pentadecapeptide BPC 157 for Accelerated Repair of Acute Grade II Hamstring Strain Confirmed by MRI. ClinicalTrials.gov: NCT07437547 (recruiting, 2026).
  5. Klicek R, Sever M, Radic B, et al. Pentadecapeptide BPC 157, in clinical trials as a therapy for inflammatory bowel disease (PL14736), is effective in the healing of colocutaneous fistulas in rats. Journal of Pharmacological Sciences. 2008;108(1):7–17. DOI: 10.1254/jphs.fp0072161. PubMed: PMID 18818478.
FAQ

Frequently asked questions

What is the dosage of BPC-157?
There is no established or approved BPC-157 dosage for humans. BPC-157 is not an approved medicine, and published human data is limited to a two-person intravenous safety pilot (10 mg then 20 mg) plus registered trials, one of which reported no results. This article documents what has been studied — not a recommended dose.
What dosage of BPC-157 has been studied in humans?
The only published human figures are from a 2025 two-person safety pilot using 10 mg then 20 mg by intravenous infusion. A registered Phase 1 trial planned single oral doses of 1, 3 or 6 mg but never reported results, and a recruiting Phase 2 trial uses once-daily subcutaneous injection for 14 days at an amount not stated in the registry.
What was the highest dosage of BPC-157 investigated in clinical trials?
In the published human literature, the highest reported amount is a single 20 mg intravenous infusion given on the second day of a two-person safety pilot. This describes that study only and is not a recommendation.
How often was BPC-157 administered in clinical research?
It varied by study: the intravenous safety pilot used one infusion per day on two days; the registered Phase 1 study used single oral doses; the recruiting Phase 2 study uses once-daily subcutaneous injections for 14 days.
Are animal research doses of BPC-157 applicable to humans?
No. Animal studies dose BPC-157 per kilogram of body weight (for example 10 µg/kg or 10 ng/kg in rats), and these cannot be converted into a human dose. Preclinical results do not establish a safe or effective human amount.
Is there an approved dosage for BPC-157?
No. BPC-157 has not been approved by the MHRA, EMA or FDA for any indication, so there is no licensed or approved dose. It is supplied for laboratory research use only.
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