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Another Reason to Take Creatine - It Works as an Effective Anti-Depressant · Hardiness with Dr Paul Taylor

• 0:08
  Speaker 1: Hey, everyone, welcome to another edition of Wisdom Wednesdays. So
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: today we are going to talk about yet another reason
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  Speaker 1: to take creating, that humble sports supplement that is turning
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  Speaker 1: out to be way more than a sports supplement. So
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  Speaker 1: you may have previously heard me talk about the impact
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  Speaker 1: of creating on brain health overall, and particularly whenever you
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  Speaker 1: are sleep deprived. It turns out that taking creatine in
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  Speaker 1: the morning when you're sleep deprived can actually reduce the
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  Speaker 1: drop in your cognitive performance that happens with poor sleep.
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  Speaker 1: Now there's yet another reason to take creating. Now, Creatine
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  Speaker 1: has been consistently shown to improve depression like behavior in
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  Speaker 1: female rodents, but we aren't rodents. Now, in humans, there
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  Speaker 1: is some preliminary evidence from clinical trials suggests that taking
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  Speaker 1: creating along with antidepressant medication is an effective intervention for
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  Speaker 1: improving symptoms depressive symptoms in people with major depressive disorder.
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  Speaker 1: So the addition of creating on top of antidepressants actually
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  Speaker 1: had a better effect in taking antidepressants alone. Now, Also,
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  Speaker 1: there was a study in participants with methanphetamine dependence and
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  Speaker 1: that reported that taking creating with or without antidepressant use
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  Speaker 1: actually improves depressive symptoms in them. However, there's a serious
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  Speaker 1: limitation of these data both those studies that I've talked
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  Speaker 1: about in that none of them included a placebo control group. Now,
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  Speaker 1: there's also some evidence from randomized control trials about the
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  Speaker 1: benefits of creating. So there was a study in participants
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  Speaker 1: with bipolar depression who were taking antidepressants, and that found
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  Speaker 1: limited evidence that adding creating in was better than a
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  Speaker 1: placebo for improving depressive symptoms. And in participants with major
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  Speaker 1: depressive disorder who were taking antidepressants, an eight week study
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  Speaker 1: and included fifty two women reported that taking five grams
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  Speaker 1: of creating daily was better than a placebo for improving
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  Speaker 1: depressive symptoms. But there was another study, a four week
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  Speaker 1: study in eighteen participants, fourteen of which were women, and
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  Speaker 1: that found no benefit from supplementing five or ten grams
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  Speaker 1: of creating a day. But we should take these findings
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  Speaker 1: with cautions because of this small sample size and particularly
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  Speaker 1: the short duration only four week study. Now I want
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  Speaker 1: to talk about a new study, which was a randomized
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  Speaker 1: control trial in adults with depression who were receaving cognitive
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  Speaker 1: behavior therapy, and they added daily supplementation with creating monohydrate
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  Speaker 1: to one of the groups. So this was a randomized
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  Speaker 1: control trial as it just it, and they found that
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  Speaker 1: it improved depressive symptoms more than the placebo. So in
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  Speaker 1: this study they used the PHQ nine the patient health
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  Speaker 1: question are nine. That's nine questions on depression and it's
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  Speaker 1: a validated study. And there were one hundred adults in
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  Speaker 1: this study, so good sample size. The averages was thirty.
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  Speaker 1: Half of them were men and half of them were women,
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  Speaker 1: which again is a good study because a lot of
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  Speaker 1: studies they just select for men because women with their
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  Speaker 1: menstrual cycles tend to mess up a lot of the data.
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  Speaker 1: So often you'll hear results of studies and they actually
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  Speaker 1: only applied to men when you look at it. But
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  Speaker 1: in this case, it was half man, it was half women,
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  Speaker 1: and their depression severity range from mild to severe. And
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  Speaker 1: again this is another good thing about this study was
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  Speaker 1: it was the kind of spectrum of depression and they
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  Speaker 1: importantly had not taken psychiatric medication the eight weeks before
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  Speaker 1: the study, so they did an eight week randomized control trial,
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  Speaker 1: and again, good does that study design because eight weeks
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  Speaker 1: is shown to be enough to move the needle on
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  Speaker 1: depression with antidepressants or are any type of interventions, and
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  Speaker 1: the participants in the intervention group they took five grams
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  Speaker 1: of creating monohydrate per day and the ones in the
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  Speaker 1: control group took a placebo and they thought they were
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  Speaker 1: getting the creating and all of the participants received forty
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  Speaker 1: five minute cognitive behavioral therapy sessions during the study. Now,
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  Speaker 1: the results showed that depressive symptoms improved in both groups,
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  Speaker 1: but there was a greater improvement in the creating group,
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  Speaker 1: and the difference between the groups met the previously established
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  Speaker 1: thressholds for clinical significance. Now this is really important because
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  Speaker 1: often there are studies done on depression and they have
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  Speaker 1: a significant impact, but they don't reach c clinical significance.
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  Speaker 1: Clinical significance is a point where most of the study
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  Speaker 1: participants would have felt noticeably better with creating, and often
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  Speaker 1: some of the studies with antidepressant medications actually don't reach
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  Speaker 1: clinical significance even though they reach statistical significance. So the
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  Speaker 1: big picture here is that that creating is a very
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  Speaker 1: beneficial nutrient for the brain. It has been shown that
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  Speaker 1: it crosses the blood brain barrier and it plays a
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  Speaker 1: role in energy production, so it actually stores high energy
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  Speaker 1: phosphate groups in the form of creating phosphate and they're
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  Speaker 1: donated from ADP to generate ATP. And ATP is the
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  Speaker 1: energy currency now because brain cells require a constant supply
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  Speaker 1: of ATP because your brain is the most energy hungry
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  Speaker 1: part of the body. That is in part are provided
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  Speaker 1: through creating phosphate. So that's one of our three energy systems.
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  Speaker 1: We have aerobic metabolism, anaerobic metabolism, and in atppc and
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  Speaker 1: this makes creating crucial for optimal brain function. And this
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  Speaker 1: is further evidence by the fact that that clinical symptoms
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  Speaker 1: of creating deficiency syndromes that's a group of conditions that
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  Speaker 1: are characterized by deficits in creating synthesis are transport in
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  Speaker 1: some people, and those people have intellectual disability and epilepsy,
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  Speaker 1: amongst the whole heap of other neurological abnormalities and low
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  Speaker 1: brain creating content and abnormalities in brain bio energetics that's
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  Speaker 1: about ATP production in the brain. They're also associated with
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  Speaker 1: several neurological disorders such as huntings AND's disease, and these
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  Speaker 1: finiinges extend to depression and supplementing with creating has actually
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  Speaker 1: been shown to increase brain creating content, so it crosses
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  Speaker 1: the blood brain barrier. So there we have a plausible
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  Speaker 1: mechanism by which creating can improve depression, and now evidence
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  Speaker 1: that it actually does now other than affecting the energy
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  Speaker 1: in the brain, preclinical evidence in other studies shows that
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  Speaker 1: supplementing with creating could help with depression by actually modulating
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  Speaker 1: or affecting neurotransmitter receptors, by activating dopamine and serotonin receptors
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  Speaker 1: and inhibiting a receptor called N methyl d aspirt it
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  Speaker 1: if you really want to know. And creating it also
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  Speaker 1: has been suggested could improve depression by decreasing oxidative stress.
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  Speaker 1: So inflammation and oxidative stress are are two of some
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  Speaker 1: of the leading theories about what actually does cause depression,
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  Speaker 1: because we know not it's not serotonin, and creating could
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  Speaker 1: potentially increased levels of BDNF brain deriving eurochopic factor, which
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  Speaker 1: I've talked about many times, is so good for the brain.
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  Speaker 1: So I think here that given all of that, the
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  Speaker 1: evidence for creating being good for overall brein function and
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  Speaker 1: your mood is pretty damned compelling. And the other advantage
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  Speaker 1: of creating compared to antidepressant use is that there are
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  Speaker 1: no side effects unless you have kidney problems, So people
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  Speaker 1: who have normal kidneys. There's been so many studies going that,
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  Speaker 1: particularly at the dose in this study five grams per day,
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  Speaker 1: there are no side effects in people with normal kidney function.
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  Speaker 1: It's probably the most tested sports supplement and it's very
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  Speaker 1: effective and as I said, very limited levels of side effects.
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  Speaker 1: And it's also bloody cheap. So jump yourself onto the
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  Speaker 1: web or go to a sports supplement store and get
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  Speaker 1: yourself some monohydrate and just don't buy anything with any
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  Speaker 1: other shit in it. Just by pure creating monohydrate five
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  Speaker 1: grams a day, ideally in the morning, because there's a
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  Speaker 1: little bit of evidence that shows if you take it
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  Speaker 1: in the evening it can interfere with sleep because it
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  Speaker 1: gives your brain energy. And for me, creating then is
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  Speaker 1: a really critical component of a positive lifestyle intervention for mood.
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  Speaker 1: And I have talked a nauseam about antidepressants. They can
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  Speaker 1: be life saving for some people, but not good for
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  Speaker 1: other people. And there's a whole heap of side effects
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  Speaker 1: and withdrawal symptoms that I've discussed previously, but I can
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  Speaker 1: tell you, and actually we are going to run a
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  Speaker 1: study on this, myself and Professor Grant sco Feed at
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  Speaker 1: some stage. But I am am very confident that if
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  Speaker 1: you did a lifestyle intervention that included regular exercise and
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  Speaker 1: reducing your amount of ultra processed foods in the diet
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  Speaker 1: and eating real food, having good sleep hygiene, taking vitamin
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  Speaker 1: D supplementation which I talked about last week and its
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  Speaker 1: effect on depression, and now creating supplementation, it would be
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  Speaker 1: an absolute blockbuster intervention for mood. But let's just watch
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  Speaker 1: this space because we are going to run a study
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  Speaker 1: on this at some stage, and just watch the space.
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  Speaker 1: But until then, get yourself on the creating train. And
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  Speaker 1: if you haven't already listened to last week's one on
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  Speaker 1: vitamin D and its impact on depression. That's it for
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  Speaker 1: this week, folks. Catch you next time.