The athlete and bodybuilder supplement creatine is increasingly being looked at as an all-round health boost, as awareness grows of its use as an anti-inflammatory and bulwark\u00a0for cells that work to\u00a0keep\u00a0cancer at bay.<\/p>\n
And while there is research pointing to a link between creatine and\u00a0cognitive function, which has\u00a0added to its growing popularity among older people, there is less certainty about another of its purported effects: helping to ward off depression.<\/p>\n
A team of scientists led by Bassam Jeryous Fares of the University of Ottawa, Canada, has found that there is no conclusive evidence either way about creatine\u2019s impact\u00a0on depressive symptoms or bipolar disorder \u2013 conditions that sometimes overlap.<\/p>\n
\u201cCreatine remains a promising lead rather than a proven remedy,\u201d the researchers said, in a paper published in the journal Brain Medicine in June.<\/p>\n
\u201cTwo trials pointed one way and three pointed another,\u201d Fares said, after reviewing the evidence from several tests of how the supplement affected people diagnosed with depression.<\/p>\n
And while the findings do not amount to what Fares labelled \u201cthe kind of evidence on which you change clinical practice,\u201d there is enough to go on to warrant \u201cfurther exploration.\u201d<\/p>\n
After all, the brain runs on much the same chemistry as muscles, the researchers said \u2013 a fact they argue is not widely known.<\/p>\n
Found in food such as meat and fish and produced by the human body, creatine supplements usually come as tablets or powder, sometimes flavoured, to be stirred or shaken into a snack or drink.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Generated in the liver, kidneys and pancreas from amino acids, creatine is carried to the muscles where it generates energy and ensures cells maintain function during stressful or intense activity.<\/p>\n
In June, a team of scientists based at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) in the United States found indications that creatine \u201csupercharges a critical class of immune cells that activate and prepare the body\u2019s key cancer-fighters.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cCreatine may eventually be recognised as an over-the-counter therapeutic agent rather than merely a dietary supplement,\u201d according to Mehdi Boroujerdi, author of the Handbook of Creatine and Creatinine In Vivo Kinetics. \u2013 dpa<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The athlete and bodybuilder supplement creatine is increasingly being looked at as an all-round health boost, as awareness…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":616132,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[276],"tags":[13649,164,18,135,19,17,167,502],"class_list":["post-616131","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mental-health","tag-creatine","tag-depression","tag-eire","tag-health","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-mental-health","tag-mentalhealth"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/117023995699342881","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/616131","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=616131"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/616131\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/616132"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=616131"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=616131"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=616131"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}