Creatine
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| It is interesting to note that the general public (until recently, me included) believes all health supplement problems are made public--they aren't. Most are not publicized until someone of public importance is adversely affected. Creatine is responsible for causing seizures. Not little ones; ones that are classed as tonic-clonic grand mals that can pop joints, compress vertebrae and possibly even break bones. Did any one read anything of the sort? If you contacted the FDA website on adverse events, you would have. Is this public? Yes because we have access to it. It is news though that is not "cost effective" enough to make it REAL public because, as I mentioned before, no one of public importance has been harmed yet and the creatine business is booming.
As educated people, my husband and I did the responsible thing--we waited three years once creatine came out to "see" what problems may occur. We searched the web, and it honestly never occurred to us to check the FDA website since we believed naively that we'd have surely read or heard something on the news by now. We learned about the wrestlers and that creatine was not believed to be the source of the deaths. We read magazines and advertisements, asked medical people who didn't know of any severe side effects (until this past month regarding kidneys).
It wasn't until my husband, in his early thirties in great condition with no vises by way of drugs, alcohol was admitted to hospital in a severe, violent seizure that we learned more potent TRUTHS about creatine supplementation. The end result is a "general public" athlete who could have died. He stopped breathing for two minutes or so, and compressed vertebrae in his back during severe seizures that lasted from three to six minutes followed by about an hour of fighting and with hours of confusion that followed. During the course of a week with three seizures in total, he dislocated both shoulders, breaking the tip of his humorous during one seizure. Poison control was called and! we learned for the first time about creatine and seizures.
I've since been searching for answers, a bit more smartly; this is how I got to your website. Did you read about this event or any other related? Was it on the news? My husband is not famous, so you probably didn't. And painfully, we have come to the realization that doctors are not informed either, nor do they seem to care to be. I have had to do so much pushing to get this event recorded and recognized by doctors it scares me--I'm just a consumer, not medically trained. All I can do is urge to think carefully and be informed that way IF something does happen you can get the RIGHT help.
When making choices about supplements keep in mind that adverse
events only affect a few people perfectly as expected, most people
slightly and with livable side effects, but some of us--we NEVER
expect to be THE statistic otherwise we wouldn't go there in the
first place--are affected severely, sometimes permanently.
Warnings are just that. It is the POTENTIAL of being a statistic and it is our inherent denial that we could ever BE one that leads us to make such decisions. You are now warned that something that can't be reversed can happen to you; then again you may be one of the lucky ones and benefit fully from creatine. It has helped people significantly in other therapies. It is the supplementation that you need to be concerned about since it is assumed that you do have normal levels of creatine in your body anyway.
If you develop seizures and you have taken creatine TELL YOUR DOCTOR AND MAKE HIM/HER LISTEN TO YOU! MAKE THEM FILL AN ADVERSE EVENT FORM reporting it! INSIST ON FOLLOW THROUGH. That is how these adverse events make it to public knowledge. Several! people, I believe, have had seizures related to creatine but because their doctors are not aware of the "public" knowledge, many may have been misdiagnosed with adult onset epilepsy or, if they currently have health problems, as a complication of the health problem. Just because a substance is naturally occurring in our bodies does not mean higher levels are safer. Be informed.
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I have been taking creatine for over a year and have not had one side effect. My fitness trainer highly recommends creatine. The problem that your husband could have encountered might have been with the brand or maybe another unknown physical problem. What brand did you use?
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My boyfriend has taken creatine in the past (before we met) and wants to take it again to gain muscle mass. I am a pre-med major and don't like the idea. I am looking for any and all side effects that taking creatine has had on other people. I do not like the idea of people trying to conform to society's "ideal body" and I don't want my loved ones to get hurt trying to conform.
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My husband is 21 years old, never had any health problems and has definitely always had a healthy heart. Until, he began taking creatine. He was on creatine for 2 1/2 months when he began having palpitations. We were both scared to death. We went to the dr. the next day, where he has been undergoing several tests (echo's, blood work, heart monitors, etc) & they have linked his problem with his creatine. We are hoping that medicine will fix this problem. For those of you who think creatine is just fine & dandy, then that is your opinion. But, please do not encourage others to take this!! It obviously affects people in different ways & if you are willing to endanger your health for a little more weight then go for it, but just remember that your health or even life could be at stake!!!!!
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I am very thankful for your opinions on creatine. I have recently been doing a lot of research on creatine and all of it suggested that creatine was perfectly safe and that there are absolutely no side effects. I was actually considering going out to buy creatine tomorrow as I am desperate to get some more weight and muscle on my body. However, after reading about the side effects of creatine on this page, I have made a final decision to definitely not try creatine. I am only 16 years old and I don't want to stuff up the rest of my life by trying to get a great body quickly. However, I don't think it's right that we are not being warned about these side effects on all the medical pages. If I hadn't stumble across this page, anything could have happened. Thank you very much for your help in making my decision on creatine.
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I am 24 years old and an avid weight lifter. I got married about a year ago and, up until that point, I either lived alone or had a private room. A few weeks after moving in with my wife, I woke up in the middle of the night to find her crying hysterically. Apparently she thought I'd had some type of seizure in my sleep. She said she tried to wake me, but I was unresponsive. The strange thing was I felt absolutely normal! Besides the expected confusion of waking up at 3 A.M. to find all the lights on and my wife in tears, I felt fine! I expected that there would be some residual effects if I'd had an actual seizure, so I kind of blew it off as a bad dream. In retrospect, I was showing an utter lack of common sense by doing this as I later found out.
The event happened again about a month later, but this time there was a noticeable "aftermath." After my wife finally managed to wake me, I literally could not talk! I tried to tell her something and it came out as senseless babble. It took almost 10 minutes before I could communicate with her normally! But again, had she not been there to wake me, I would have slept right through it.
This second occurrence got me concerned enough to see see a doctor and, in my consultation, I realized that I had been having what he called "absence seizures" for the past 4 years! I would have strange spells of dizziness or "disconnection" but I always attributed it to a "minor" side effect of medication I'd been taking for asthma. Again, a total lack or common sense, or at least knowledge, on my part.
How this all ties in is that I'd been taking creatine as well as
stimulants since I've been about 20. It stands to reason that I
very well could have been having full, grand-mal seizures over that
entire period and not known it because I'd been asleep. Upon talking
to my college roommate about it, he mentioned that he had heard
"strange noises" coming from my room occasionally like
I was choking, exactly how my wife had described it, but he said
that it always quickly passed. The first time it happened (over
3 years ago) he was concerned that I might be in distress and came
into my room to check, but when he got there I was asleep, breathing
normally. He mentioned it to me and we passed it off as some kind
of "snoring."
Taking your advice, I checked the FDA website for occurrence of
the words creatine and seizure. I found that, as you said, there
were references to situations where people had reported taking creatine
at a time when seizures had occurred. There were 5 that I could
find. Of the five, three indicated that the patient was also taking
a stimulant supplement. Out of curiosity, I searched for seizure/stimulant
connections and found close to 70! And since I'm not familiar with
the FDA database, I'm sure that there are probably cases for creatine
that I didn't uncover.
I'm wondering if your husband was also taking supplements containing stimulants. Several 'Diet' or 'Themo' supplements contain these substances as well as several that promise a 'Ripped' physique or increased 'Metabo'lism. Not mentioning any names!
I'd be very curious to know if there might be a connection in his case.
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