Nandrolone esters can be used as a form of androgen replacement therapy for treatment of androgen deficiency in men. However, they have not generally been used for this purpose, and have instead mostly been used only as anabolic agents. In any case, nandrolone decanoate has widely been used at low doses as a means of androgen replacement in postmenopausal women, for instance to maintain or increase bone mineral density and decrease the risk of osteoporosis. It is one of only three androgens approved for androgen replacement in postmenopausal women, the others being testosterone (and esters) and methyltestosterone. Nandrolone esters have more recently been proposed for more widespread treatment of androgen deficiency in men due to favorable properties including their high ratio of anabolic to androgenic effect and hence lower or negligible risk of scalp hair loss, prostate enlargement, and prostate cancer relative to testosterone. Nandrolone esters and related compounds such as trestolone and dimethandrolone undecanoate have also been studied as means of androgen replacement in investigational male contraceptive regimens.
