Fat cells respond to hGH by releasing some of their content in the bloodstream. Injecting sub-q will saturate the receptor of the fat cells in the surrounding area, causing them to release a good part of their content. This may cause a pockmarked injection area, i.e. a "hole" in the bodyfat at the injection point.
There are documented cases around on the boards. Don't know if they have pics though...
OTOH, pubmed says this :
Clin Endocrinol Metab. 1982 Nov;55(5):1003-6. Related Articles, Links
A comparison of subcutaneous and intramuscular administration of human growth hormone in the therapy of growth hormone deficiency.
Russo L, Moore WV.
The sc and im administration of human GH (hGH) was compared in the therapy of GH deficiency. The peak and integrated concentrations of hGH in the plasma of the patients were similar after sc and im injection of an initial dose (0.1 U/kg) of hGH. The peak hGH concentration occurred at 2 h in both groups. The posttreatment height velocity and the change in height velocity at 3-month intervals were also similar in the im and sc groups. The somatomedin generation test resulted in a higher mean peak of somatomedin C after sc injection; however, if the individual peaks of somatomedin C were averaged, there was no difference between sc and im injection. A cross-over at 9 months of therapy to determine patient acceptance of im vs. sc injections indicated overwhelming acceptance of the sc route. The antibody responses to hGH were similar in both groups. We conclude that sc injection of hGH is an effective and safe mode of therapy for GH deficiency. The lipoatrophy that occurred infrequently at the injection site can be eliminated by rotation of sites. Subcutaneous administration of hGH will be more acceptable by the patients with less pain and less noncompliance.
PMID: 6889608 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
Now, we must keep in mind that this is about GH therapy, where they try to make up for lack of endogenous GH with injections of physiological doses. A lot of people using hGH use supraphysiological doses, which makes these holes in the bodyfat a possibly more important factor.
And there's this too, I'm sure someone can get the full text and send it to you via email or even post it here, leave it here for a little bit then delete it, because, well you know...
Lab Clin Med. 1971 Dec;78(6):1003-4. Related Articles, Links
Elevated human growth hormone (HGH) levels in partial and total lipoatrophy.
Tzagournis M, George J, Herrold J.
PMID: 5131829 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]