Study finds taking creatine supplement along with antidepressants help women recover faster from depression.
Winston Armani, Deseret News
SALT LAKE CITY — Athletes know all about an amino acid called creatine. It’s been used for decades to improve performance in competition.
Our body makes about half of what we need. The rest comes from eating meat and fish. But this dietary supplement appears to do a lot more than just build muscles.
Researchers at the University of Utah and three South Korean universities have documented what may be the brain protecting properties of this substance.
The eight-week study included 52 women, ages 19-65, with depression. All were taking the antidepressant Lexapro. Researchers observed dramatic improvements in women's brain chemistry after combining only 5 grams of creatine with their daily doses of antidepressant medications.
Half of those in the creatine group showed no signs of depression compared with one-quarter in the placebo group.
“What we found is that if you were taking creatine together with your antidepressant from the start, that you would get better twice and fast and twice as much as women who just got the placebo,” said Dr. Perry Renshaw with the University of Utah Brain Institute. “If we can get people to feel better more quickly, they’re more likely to stay with treatment and, ultimately, have better outcomes.”
There were no significant adverse side effects associated with creatine.
Creatine is a popular supplement among bodybuilders and athletes who are trying to add muscle mass or improve athletic ability. Inside the body, it is converted into phosphocreatine and stored in muscle. During high-intensity exercise, phosphocreatine is converted into an energy source for cells.
How creatine works against depression is not exactly known. Renshaw and his colleagues suggest that the body's making of more phosphocreatine may contribute to the earlier and greater response to antidepressants. Typically, antidepressants take four to six weeks to start working. Those in the study using creatine saw improvements in as early as two weeks.
Though the collaborative study with South Korea involved only women, creatine has the potential to benefit both women and men. For those who don’t respond well to antidepressants, creatine could become an inexpensive way to improve treatment outcomes.
