What did @abbott_collin actually say?
The creator recommended injecting BPC-157 "around the deltoid caps" for a rotator cuff injury, specifically warning viewers not to inject directly into bone. He also gave needle gauge and length suggestions based on body composition, recommending a 1/2-inch needle for leaner individuals and a 5/16-inch for those with more subcutaneous fat.
To be fair, he kept the video short, didn't make wild therapeutic claims, and reminded people to "be safe." That restraint is worth noting. But the advice is still coming from someone selling affiliate codes to unregulated peptide suppliers, which matters when you're talking about injection protocols for a compound that has never been approved by the FDA for human use.
Does the science back this up?
The idea of injecting near the site of injury has some theoretical basis, but the human evidence is thin at best. Most of what we know about BPC-157 comes from animal studies, and the translation to humans is far from settled.
BPC-157 (Body Protection Compound-157) is a synthetic peptide derived from a protein found in gastric juice. Rodent studies, including work by Sikiric et al. published repeatedly in journals like Current Pharmaceutical Design (2018) and Journal of Physiology - Paris (2000), have shown accelerated tendon and ligament healing in rat models. The mechanism appears to involve upregulation of growth hormone receptors and nitric oxide pathways. However, no randomized controlled trials in humans have been published as of this writing. Zero. The leap from rat tendon to human rotator cuff is a large one, and the creator doesn't acknowledge that gap at all.
- Sikiric et al. (2018, Current Pharmaceutical Design): tendon healing in rats, not humans
- No FDA-approved human indication exists for BPC-157
- Subcutaneous injection protocols for peptides are generally adapted from insulin or growth hormone literature, not BPC-157 specific data
What did they get wrong (or right)?
The needle size logic is partially reasonable. Subcutaneous injections in insulin delivery literature do generally recommend shorter needles for leaner individuals and longer ones for those with more adipose tissue. A 2016 study by Hirsch et al. in Diabetes Technology & Therapeutics supports individualized needle length based on skin fold thickness. So the underlying principle isn't wrong.
What is wrong, or at least incomplete, is the framing that injecting near the deltoid is the right approach for a rotator cuff injury specifically. The rotator cuff involves four muscles and their tendons sitting deep to the deltoid. Subcutaneous injection near the shoulder doesn't mean the peptide is going to localize to the supraspinatus or infraspinatus. There is no good evidence that subcutaneous injection near an injury site produces meaningfully higher local concentrations than injecting elsewhere. The "inject near the injury" logic is biologically plausible but unproven for this compound in this context.
He also refers to needle sizes in a way that's easy to misread. "1564" and "516" appear to be shorthand for gauge and length combinations, but the transcript makes them nearly impossible to parse clearly. That ambiguity in an injection tutorial is a problem.
What should you actually know?
BPC-157 is not approved for human use in the United States, Canada, Australia, or the EU. It is sold as a "research chemical" by vendors like the ones this creator is affiliated with, which means no standardized dosing, no verified purity, and no regulatory oversight. The FDA has issued warnings about peptides sold through compounding pharmacies and research chemical suppliers.
If you have a rotator cuff injury, there are actual evidence-based options: physical therapy, corticosteroid injections under imaging guidance, and in some cases surgery. Those aren't exciting content, but they have human trial data behind them.
The creator isn't necessarily acting in bad faith, but he is giving injection guidance for an unapproved compound while earning affiliate commissions from the suppliers. That conflict of interest should be front of mind when you're deciding how much weight to give this advice. Watching a 30-second reel is not a substitute for a conversation with a sports medicine physician or orthopedic specialist who can actually assess your shoulder.