Creatine & Insulin Resistance

I was flipping through the June issue of Muscular Development and came across a short supplement review regarding long term creatine use and insulin resistance. They state that short term use of creatine (1-4 weeks) lowers blood sugar and increases glycogen stores but, a study by Australian researchers (reported in the Annals of Nutrition and Metabolism) demonstrated that long term usage (42 days) had the opposite effect and interfered with glucose metabolism.
It would seem that the first statement about short-term creatine use is their own and not reflected by the study. Has this been show to be true?
What do you all think of this?

BTW……The magazine was laying around at work. I didn’t buy it. Honest!!!

Here’s the abstract.

Creatine Supplementation Affects Glucose Homeostasis but Not Insulin Secretion in Humans
Kieron B. Rooney, Janet M. Bryson, Alison L. Digney, Caroline D. Rae, Campbell H. Thompson

Human Nutrition Unit, School of Molecular and Microbial Biosciences, University of Sydney, Australia
Address of Corresponding Author
Annals of Nutrition & Metabolism 2003;47:11-15 (DOI: 10.1159/000068908

Aims: In this study, it was investigated whether the glucose homeostasis is affected by dietary creatine supplementation. For this purpose, the plasma glucose concentration and the plasma insulin response to an oral glucose load were measured in creatine-supplemented vegetarians. Methods: The subjects were supplemented with either 5 g of creatine monohydrate (creatine-treated group, CREAT) or 5 g of maltodextrin (control group, CON) per day for 42 days. On days 0 and 43, blood samples were collected before as well as 10, 20, and 30 min following an oral glucose load and analyzed for plasma creatine, insulin, and glucose levels. Results: Creatine supplementation resulted in an increase in plasma creatine (CREAT 92.7 ? 14.6 ?M vs. CON 31.2 ? 3.2 ?M; p = 0.001). There was a trend (p = 0.07) towards elevated fasting plasma glucose levels following creatine supplementation, while the plasma glucose response to the glucose load was enhanced (CREAT 168.2 ? 5.3 mM? min vs. CON 129.6 ? 14.7 mM ?min; p = 0.05). There was no difference observed in the plasma insulin response to the glucose load between the groups. Conclusion: This study shows that creatine supplementation may result in abnormalities in glucose homeostasis in the absence of changes in insulin secretion

Bump.

Boy, topics posted in the wee hours of the AM get burried fast!

Interesting.

so creatine makes you fat, but doesn’t make you fat?

the study was done on vegeterians. how does that apply to the average bodybuilder?

im more than sure that going vegeterian for long periods of time would have some kind of adverse effect on insulin in the human body.

P-Dog…I thought it was odd that they used vegeterians. So what you are saying is that this study probably has no “real world” application.

yeah basically. how many vegeterians do you know that supp with creatine? my guess is a fat goose egg.

and even if you do, a vegeterian diet is so far off from a traditional bodybuilding diet that the study couldnt say for certain how it would effect you or i.

way to many other variables at play here.

yeah basically. how many vegeterians do you know that supp with creatine? my guess is a fat goose egg.

and even if you do, a vegeterian diet is so far off from a traditional bodybuilding diet that the study couldnt say for certain how it would effect you or i.

way to many other variables at play here.

They use vegetarians to lower variables in this case.

Vegetarians typically have lower creatine levels because they don’t eat the natural sources of creatine that their meat eating counterparts would. If they didn’t use vegetarians, they’d probably get a much wider variation of base creatine levels depending on how much of what meats the subects ate.

As to the explanation of the results, I don’t know. I can’t even get at the full text cause that journal is apparently not in my school’s library.

Travis: I see what you mean about using vegetarians, makes for fewer variables. Definitely would be good to have access to the full text though.

I suppose if this is valid, and the statement that short term creatine supplementation lowers glucose levels is also valid, then cycling off creatine for a few days after say a month of continuous usage perhaps would be beneficial. ( It would be interesting to hear J.B. 's take on this.)

But, for now, I’m with you P-Dog. Not going to worry about it.

Thanks guys.