Can Creatine Supplements Boost Brain Function?

“It’s encouraging to see that the two domains that we thought would be most affected [memory and executive function] were affected,” says Matthew Taylor, associate professor of dietetics and nutrition at University of Kansas Medical Center and senior author of the study. “It’s just a matter of trying to figure out if this is a real finding or not.”

Why wouldn’t it be real? It was just a pilot study, which means the main goal was simply to see if the study could be done. The researchers wanted to make sure you could get people with Alzheimer’s disease to take 20g of creatine every day and that it wouldn’t make them sick or cause any other unpleasant side effects. That’s why the study only included 20 people and why there was no control group — a comparison group of people with Alzheimer’s who did not take creatine.

Time for more studies

“Alzheimer’s disease, dementia and cognition are very complex and multifaceted subjects,” says neurologist Ayesha Sherzai, M.D., co-director of the Alzheimer’s Prevention Program at Loma Linda University. “For us to rely on one compound for our brains to get healthier, we need robust enough data to support that before we jump on the bandwagon.”

The robust data Sherzai refers to would come from a randomized controlled clinical trial, widely regarded as the gold standard for testing whether a drug or supplement — such as creatine — has a specific therapeutic effect. It would usually include hundreds to thousands of participants to ensure meaningful results. The control group would not receive the supplement, which would help ensure that any improvements in test scores were due to the creatine and not some other factor. Finally, assigning people to the control group or the creatine group at random would further ensure that results are based on the supplement and not the characteristics of the people in that group.

The pilot study also did not look at how the improvement in test scores might affect daily life. “These changes are small. Is it going to help you remember where you put your car keys?” asks Cydney E. McQueen, a doctor of pharmacy and clinical professor at the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Pharmacy, whose research focuses on nutritional supplements.

Additional, larger studies could answer questions like that. “Our team is actively pursuing funding to do bigger clinical trials,” Taylor says. 

Should healthy older adults take creatine?

A handful of small studies have suggested that daily creatine supplements may help improve memory in healthy older adults. So there’s certainly reason for scientists to keep digging into this fascinating topic.

“There’s growing evidence that creatine supplementation may support brain health and cognition across the lifespan,” Taylor says. But it’s early days. “Some small studies suggest creatine may benefit cognitive performance, particularly under stressful conditions, like sleep deprivation. There’s also some indication that creatine may have additive benefits when combined with exercise, which is already known to support brain health,” Taylor says.

But let’s put the existing research in perspective.

Like the Alzheimer’s pilot study, research into the brain benefits of creatine in healthy adults has been conducted on very small numbers of people, meaning a couple dozen per study. And the studies tend to last a week to a few months. It’s not clear how long an older adult might benefit from creatine.

Also, within this handful of studies in healthy older adults, no two studies were conducted in the same way. Some studies might have involved 5g of creatine a day for four weeks; other studies might have looked at 20g a day for four months. A critical part of the scientific process is replication. After one study gets good results, the real proof comes when later studies, done the same way, get the same results. The research isn’t there yet regarding the impact of creatine supplements on the brains of older adults.

“Much more research is needed before we can draw firm conclusions,” Taylor says.

Before you start any new supplement, you should talk to your doctor or pharmacist, McQueen says. “There are a few [drug] interactions with creatine — all manageable by dosage adjustment, so it’s important that the patient’s health care professional knows about the use of creatine.”

There’s more support for using creatine to maintain muscle in older adults, says Sherzai. But she adds, it’s really important for people who want to try creatine to speak with their doctor, who could check their kidney function, their liver function and general well-being before they give them the green light to use it. But that’s for muscle loss, she says, adding “I don’t think we have enough data to say that it could benefit their cognitive function at this point.”