The Efficacy and Safety of Creatine for High Homocysteine

"The Efficacy and Safety of Creatine
for High Homocysteine" The average blood levels
of homocysteine in men is about one and a half points
higher than in women. Maybe that's one of the reasons
why men tend to be at higher risk for cardiovascular disease. Women don't need to make
as much creatine as men since they tend to have
less muscle mass, and that may help explain the
gender gap in homocysteine levels. If you remember from my last video,
in the process of making creatine, your body produces homocysteine
as a by-product. So maybe for people with stubbornly high homocysteine
levels that don't sufficiently respond to B vitamins, perhaps creatine
supplementation may represent a practical strategy to draw homocysteine
levels down into the normal range.

It seemed to work in rats, but in humans,
it worked in one study, this one, but didn't seem to work in another
study, this one, or this one, and in this study homocysteine
levels were even driven up. So this whole suggestion that
taking creatine supplements would lower homocysteine
was called into question. But all those studies were done
in non-vegetarians, so they were effectively already supplementing
with creatine every day in the form of muscle meat, so they were basically just testing
higher versus lower supplementation. Those eating strictly plant-based
make all their creatine from scratch, so may be more sensitive
to an added creatine source, but there were never any studies
on creatine supplementation in vegans for homocysteine
lowering until now.

They took a bunch of vegans
who were not supplementing their diets with vitamin B12,
so some of their homocysteine levels were through the roof,
a few as high as 50 when the ideal is more like under 10,
but after taking some creatine for a few weeks all of their homocysteine
levels normalized. Before… …and after. Now they didn't really normalize,
which would have been under 10, but that's presumably because
they weren't taking any B12. Give vegetarians and vegans
vitamin B12 supplements, either daily dosing or once a week,
and their levels really normalize in a matter of months, but the
fact that even without B12, that you could bring down homocysteine
levels with creatine alone suggests— to me at least—that if your homocysteine
is elevated on a plant-based diet, meaning above 10, despite
taking B12 supplements, and eating greens and beans to get
enough folate, well then it may be worth experimenting with
supplementing with a gram of creatine for a few weeks and see if your
homocysteine levels come down.

Why one gram? That's approximately
how much nonvegetarians are not having to make themselves; that's how much
erased vegetarian discrepancies in blood and muscle, and how much has
been shown to be safe in the longer-term. How safe exactly is it? Well, one
can take a bit of comfort in the fact that it's one of the world's
best-selling dietary supplements, with literally billions of servings taken,
and the only consistently reported side effect has been weight gain,
presumed to be from water retention. The only serious side effects
appear to be among those with pre-existing kidney diseases taking
whopping doses like 20 grams a day. A concern was raised that creatine
could potentially form a carcinogen, known as N-nitrososarcosine,
when it hits the acid bath of the stomach, but when actually put to the test this
does not appear to be a problem. Bottomline, doses of up 3 grams
a day are unlikely to pose any risk provided high purity creatine is used, and as we all know dietary supplements
are not regulated by the FDA and may contain contaminants or not
actually contain what's on the label, contaminants generated during
the industrial production.

When researchers looked at 33
samples of creatine supplements made in the U.S. and Europe, they all did
actually contain creatine, which is nice, but about half exceeded the
maximum level recommended by food safety authorities
for at least one contaminant. The researchers recommend that
consumers give their preference to products obtained by producers
that ensure the highest quality control. Easier said than done. Because of the potential risks
I don't think people should be taking creatine supplements willy-nilly,
but the potential benefits may exceed the potential risks, if again, you're
on a healthy plant-based diet, taking B12 and your homocysteine
levels are still not under 10, I would suggest giving a gram a day of
creatine a try to see if it brings it down.

The reason I did this whole video
series all goes back to this study, which found that although the
overall cardiovascular disease risk is lower in vegetarians
and vegans combined, they appeared to be at slightly
higher stroke risk. I went through a list of potential causes, arrived
at elevated homocysteine, and the solution? A regular,
reliable source of vitamin B12. The cheapest, easiest method
that I personally use is one 2500 mcg chewable
tablet of cyanocobalamin. In fact you can just use
2000 mcg once a week, and cyanocobalamin is the
most stable source of B12.

Take that once a week. And then as I detailed in this video,
a back-up plan for those doing that and still having elevated
homocysteine, is an empirical trial of one gram a day of
creatine supplementation, which has been shown to improve
at least capillary blood flow in those who started out with
high homocysteine levels. The bottom line is that plant-based
diets appear to markedly reduce our risk of multiple
leading killer diseases— heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and
many common types of cancer— but an increased risk of stroke
may represent an Achilles heel. Nonetheless, they have the potential to
achieve a truly exceptional health span if they face this problem forthrightly
by restricting salt intake and taking other practical measures
that promote brain artery health.

Nonetheless, these considerations
do not justify nutritional nihilism. On balance, even strictly plant-based
diets offer such versatile protection to long-term health that they
remain highly recommendable. Most likely, the optimum strategy
is to eat plant-based, along with going out of the way
to eat particularly protective foods as I talked about before,
regular aerobic exercise, and most importantly
taking your vitamin B12. Oh, and try not to huff whipped
cream charged in canister gas..

Video Transcript – As found on YouTube

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