Read This First
This page is not built on clinical evidence. It is built on the FDA's 2024 review of the compound, the analytical chemistry of seized product, and the regulatory record. What CJC-1295 does in people is covered on the library entry; this page is about what is in the vial, and why that question is harder to answer for this compound than for most.
"CJC-1295" is not one substance. The FDA counted at least five distinct bulk substances and nine names in use for them, and wrote that this "represents a safety risk for patients as they may be dosed with a different" substance "than the physician ordered."1 A buyer who has not settled which of the five they are buying has not yet asked the first question.
Legal Status
Where Does CJC-1295 Stand?
Approved nowhere, in any form. The company that developed it withdrew it from clinical trials in 2006 after a participant died, and no company has developed it since.1
In the United States it has been through the compounding review process and failed it. On 4 December 2024 the FDA's Pharmacy Compounding Advisory Committee voted 0 to 13 against placing the free base and each DAC form on the 503A bulks list, and 1 to 12 against the acetate, following an FDA recommendation against all five.2 No pharmacy in the United States has a lawful basis to compound it.
What Does the FDA Say About It?
Two things, from two documents.
The Category 2 entry, in place since September 2023 and now listed under substances nominated but withdrawn: compounded drugs containing CJC-1295 "may pose risk for immunogenicity for certain routes of administration and may have complexities with regard to peptide-related impurities and API characterization. FDA has identified serious adverse events associated with CJC-1295 including increased heart rate and systemic vasodilatory reaction. Available clinical data are limited."3
The 2024 review goes further on characterisation. Of the five substances, it found two of the DAC salts "not well-characterized from the physical and chemical" standpoint, and could not determine which substance had been used even in the published human studies.1 That is the regulator saying it cannot pin down what the trial-grade material was, let alone what is on sale.
Has It Ever Been Compounded Lawfully?
Briefly, and the FDA's review records how it ended: a press release from the US Attorney for the Eastern District of Kentucky describes a pharmacy that compounded and distributed CJC-1295 products from October 2018 to April 2020. One outsourcing facility reported compounding it in 2019 and 2020. None has reported doing so since.1
The review also notes websites stating the compound is "no longer available," which describes the moment supply left pharmacies and moved to sellers labelling it for research.1
Product Identity
Which CJC-1295?
| Name on the label | What it usually means | Human data |
|---|---|---|
| CJC-1295 DAC, CJC-1295 with DAC | Tetrasubstituted GHRH 1-29 with the albumin-binding linker; the ConjuChem compound | Three studies in 63 healthy adults; one terminated patient trial1 |
| CJC-1295 no DAC, CJC-1295 without DAC, Mod GRF 1-29, Modified GRF | The same four-substitution fragment without the linker | None1 |
| CJC-1295 (unspecified) | Either; sellers often do not say, and rarely state the salt form | Cannot be determined from the label |
| CJC-1295/Ipamorelin blend | A fixed-ratio mixture, typically of the non-DAC form with ipamorelin | None for the combination |
The FDA found websites selling both forms as "research use only," in blends with ipamorelin and with tesamorelin, generally without specifying whether the product is free base, acetate or trifluoroacetate salt.1 The salt matters for dose: a milligram of acetate salt contains less peptide than a milligram of free base, and a trifluoroacetate salt carries a counter-ion with its own toxicity questions.
What Has Been Found in Seized Product?
Two published analyses, a decade apart, and they describe the market's evolution.
In 2009 Norwegian police and customs submitted an unknown preparation to the national anti-doping laboratory, which identified a 29-residue amidated peptide consistent with CJC-1295 and noted, in passing, that the substance was "readily available" and being used in bodybuilding. That preparation did not contain the DAC linker, which the FDA regards as the first documented appearance of the non-DAC form anywhere.41
In 2019 Danish customs seizures were found to contain analogues of GHRP-2, GHRP-6, ipamorelin and modified GRF 1-29 that all carried an extra glycine at the N-terminus. The authors concluded that detection methods targeting these secretagogues "should hence be updated accordingly."5
The second finding is the important one for a buyer. Powders sold as Mod GRF 1-29 contained a molecule one residue longer than the one on the label. Whether that was a synthesis error or a deliberate change to evade testing, the authors do not say. Either way, a certificate reporting purity would have shown a clean single peak, because the sample was pure. It was pure something else.
Purity Testing Versus Identity Testing
| Test | Question it answers | Question it cannot answer |
|---|---|---|
| HPLC purity | What proportion of the sample is one substance | Whether that substance is CJC-1295, with or without DAC, with or without an extra residue |
| Mass spectrometry identity | Whether the mass matches the expected molecule | How much of the sample it represents; whether the DAC linker is intact and reactive |
| Endotoxin assay | Whether bacterial cell-wall fragments are present | Identity or content |
| Sequence confirmation (MS/MS) | The order of residues, including an extra glycine | Rarely offered; ask |
For this compound specifically, a mass spectrometry result that reports a single number is worth reading carefully. The DAC and non-DAC forms differ by a well-defined mass, and so does a glycine-extended analogue. A seller who cannot say which mass was observed has not confirmed identity.
Certificates of Analysis
What a Certificate Is
A laboratory report on one batch. Read it for the laboratory's name and independence from the seller, the lot number and whether it matches the vial, the date, the exact substance named including DAC status and salt form, and which tests were actually run.
What It Cannot Establish
That the vial in hand came from the batch tested. Its value rests on a chain of custody the buyer cannot inspect. A certificate is a PDF; nothing about the format prevents reuse across batches or fabrication. The FDA has documented fabricated pharmacy names and labels on gray-market peptide products in the GLP-1 market, and there is no reason to expect a smaller, less scrutinised market to be cleaner.6
"Research Use Only"
Does the Label Change Anything?
No. It is a liability position adopted by the seller, not a regulatory category. The FDA has held in warning letters to peptide sellers that the disclaimer does not survive product copy establishing human use; intended use is read from the whole page.7 A page describing growth hormone release, fat loss and a nightly dosing schedule before bed, followed by a line that the vial is not for human consumption, has supplied the agency's argument.
The Injection-Site Problem
Why Is This Compound Different?
Because for CJC-1295 the injection site is not just where the product goes in. It is where the documented toxicity is.
In the healthy-volunteer trials, injection-site reactions occurred in about 70 percent of people on the DAC compound, more severe and prolonged at higher doses, with transient hives at the site in nearly 30 percent.1 In rats and dogs given daily subcutaneous doses, haemorrhage, inflammation and necrosis at the injection site were "consistently observed" at every dose tested.1
That is with characterised material. The DAC linker is a maleimide, a chemically reactive group designed to bond to whatever thiol it meets first. In the body that is albumin. In a vial, over time, in water, it is whatever is there, and a degraded or impure product has more candidates.
A reaction at the injection site is the one adverse effect of this compound that a user can see. In the trials it was the most common event, and in animals it progressed to tissue death. It should not be read as normal.
Storage and Handling
What Is Known
No manufacturer-validated storage specification exists for any product a consumer can buy. What can be stated is general peptide chemistry and one compound-specific point.
Lyophilised powder is more stable than solution. Heat and repeated freeze-thaw cycles degrade peptides. The non-DAC form has a half-life in the body measured in minutes by analogy with sermorelin, which is why community protocols inject it several times a day; nothing about that is a stability question, but it multiplies the number of times a multi-dose vial is entered.
The compound-specific point is the maleimide. Maleimides hydrolyse in aqueous solution, which inactivates the linker; a DAC product reconstituted and stored for weeks may progressively lose the property it is sold for and behave more like the non-DAC form. No study has measured this for a retail product. It is chemistry, not data.
Multi-Dose Vials
The FDA's guidance for compounded injectables is to discard a multi-dose vial within 28 days of first use regardless of what remains or what the supplier says, and to use a new sterile needle and syringe for every dose.6 For a product injected two or three times daily, that is a lot of entries into one rubber stopper.
Signs to Stop Rather Than Proceed
Injection-site redness, swelling or hardness that grows with successive doses, or any darkening or breakdown of skin at the site
Hives at or near the injection site
Flushing, warmth, light-headedness or a racing pulse after a dose, which were documented systemic reactions in the trials1
Powder that does not dissolve cleanly, or a solution that is cloudy or discoloured
A label that does not state DAC status or salt form, or a certificate that names a different one
The first three are what the compound does. The last two are what an unverified product does. Neither can be distinguished from the other by the person experiencing it.
Community Language
CJC-1295 DAC
The ConjuChem compound: modified GHRH 1-29 with an albumin-binding linker. Half-life of about a week. The only form with human data.1
Mod GRF 1-29, CJC-1295 no DAC
The same modified fragment without the linker. Never studied in humans; first documented in a seized vial.4
Sermorelin
Unmodified GHRH 1-29, once an approved drug. Not the same molecule, and the substitutions are what make CJC-1295 different.
Blend
A vial containing a fixed ratio of two or more peptides, usually CJC-1295 and ipamorelin. No study has tested any such combination, and a certificate for a blend must report each component separately to mean anything.
Category 2
The FDA's interim classification for nominated compounding substances that may present significant safety risks. CJC-1295 was placed there in 2023 and is now listed as nominated but withdrawn.3
Certificate of analysis
A laboratory report on one batch. It describes the batch tested, not necessarily the vial received.
Related ONPEPS Coverage
CJC-1295 library entry: the trials, the death and the December 2024 vote
Ipamorelin sourcing and quality: the other half of the stack
Compounded, gray market and counterfeit semaglutide: what the regulators have documented
Sources
US Food and Drug Administration. CJC-1295-related bulk drug substances: FDA review for the December 4, 2024 meeting of the Pharmacy Compounding Advisory Committee. Docket FDA-2024-N-4777. fda.gov
US Food and Drug Administration. Final Summary Minutes of the Pharmacy Compounding Advisory Committee Meeting, December 4, 2024. Approved 21 February 2025. fda.gov
US Food and Drug Administration. Category 2 of the Bulk Substances Nominated Under Sections 503A or 503B of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act. Entry for CJC-1295. Content current as of 22 April 2026. fda.gov
Henninge J, Pepaj M, Hullstein I, Hemmersbach P. Identification of CJC-1295, a growth-hormone-releasing peptide, in an unknown pharmaceutical preparation. Drug Test Anal. 2010;2(11-12):647-650. Paywalled. pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21204297
Gajda PM, Holm NB, Hoej LJ, Rasmussen BS, Dalsgaard PW, Reitzel LA, et al. Glycine-modified growth hormone secretagogues identified in seized doping material. Drug Test Anal. 2019;11(2):350-354. Paywalled. pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30136411
US Food and Drug Administration. FDA's Concerns with Unapproved GLP-1 Drugs Used for Weight Loss. Drug Alerts and Statements. Cited for the agency's general guidance on multi-dose vials and fabricated labels. fda.gov
US Food and Drug Administration. Warning Letter: Gram Peptides. MARCS-CMS 721806, 31 March 2026. fda.gov
Not Medical Advice
No form of CJC-1295 holds a marketing authorisation for human use in any jurisdiction. If you are already using a product obtained outside a pharmacy, the route back to oversight is a clinician who knows what you have taken, and given the documented heart-rate and blood-pressure effects, that conversation is worth having before the next dose rather than after.
Regulatory sources verified 16 September 2026. The FDA's compounding categories are under active revision and the record changes frequently. Re-verify before relying on any statement here.