Could creatine have a dark side?

The Allure of the Perfect Body

We spend our lives enthralled by the superlative athletic performance encased in the perfect body. The popularity of Instagram posts from the likes of Paulina Porizkova, buses plastered with photoshopped near-nudes and indeed the survival and extinction of civilisations are a testament to the enduring power of this maxim. The recent film The Substance highlights this too: an ageing Demi Moore plays a woman misled into believing a miracle product will restore her lost youth, with tragic consequences.

Creatine: The Modern “Magic Substance”

Shelving Moore’s disillusionment and disappointment for just a second, in creatine we have a magical substance that might help us achieve the heights of athleticism and anatomical magnificence that was once the exclusive realm of the elite athlete.

It has long been embraced by the athletic community and gym enthusiasts as a supplement that could significantly enhance energy, physical performance, the growth of muscle mass and endurance. For those who want to run faster, further and longer, with bigger muscles and super-charged stamina, taking creatine is their passport into the gilded realm of extraordinary accomplishment with untold rewards.

Cognitive Benefits and Brain Protection

Aside from boosting exercise capacity and muscle mass, creatine can augment cognitive performance and protect our brains, which is especially important for athletes engaged in contact sports who are constantly subjected to the incrementally damaging effects of recurring brain trauma. In fact, the International Society of Sports Nutrition (ISSN) considers this supplement to be so vital for athletes who need all the brain protection they can get that the ISSN considers it to be a dereliction of duty and care not to advise them about the wisdom of adding this supplement to their daily regimen.

Creatine’s Multitalented Benefits

Creatine is loaded with a veritable smorgasbord of capabilities. Aside from an energiser and muscle builder, it’s a weight-loss promoter. It can lower cholesterol, help reduce rising blood glucose levels, improve bone strength and reverse osteoporosis, alleviate the crippling effects of osteoarthritis and lower homocysteine (a protein that increases our risk of heart disease, stroke and Alzheimer’s). It can also help to reduce anxiety and depression, stimulate the immune system and reduce wrinkles when applied as a lotion. Creatine is a multitalented wonder potion we all need to protect us against the ravages of ageing.

We obtain creatine from red meat, fish and poultry. If we’re lucky, about 1–2g per day, but experts advise that we need at least 3g per day as we get older, which would suggest that we need to supplement to enjoy its benefits. Vegetarians who consume no animal protein would certainly have to augment their supplies if they wish to be graced with all the advantages of saddling up with creatine.

New Research and Potential Risks

Sadly, as is often the case, any product that appears to be exclusively salubrious might portend hidden caveats. Certainly, until now, taking creatine was thought to be entirely good for us. Research appears to have demonstrated that it can be utilised to shore up our immune defences and help eradicate cancer cells.

Unfortunately, studies are now emerging showing just the opposite — that creatine can facilitate cancer cell growth and migration by providing an energy source for these errant and pernicious cells. In the test tube, creatine appears to stimulate the growth of several cancers, including pancreatic, bowel, breast, lung and liver.

The authors of this research indicate that in the past creatine was seen entirely as an energy source for muscle health. They caution that as we understand more about the behaviour of creatine, the more complex the field has become. As this nutrient could also support energy for cancer migration and metabolism, consuming more of it to promote better body health should be viewed more conservatively.

Aside from this test-tube evidence, we should derive comfort from the fact that all the human trials that have witnessed creatine being taken as a supplement over a number of years haven’t demonstrated any rise in the incidence of cancer.

Integrating Creatine into Your Routine

Nevertheless, how should this fresh research be integrated into our daily supplement regime? Personally, I’m going to keep taking creatine when I go to the gym two to three times per week and hope that any budding cancer cells I might have residing in my unsuspecting body do not latch on to their stimulating potential and that I do not end up like Demi Moore’s ravaged cinematic effigy.