What Science Every Parent And Coach Should Know About Creatine

Somewhere in the last two years, creatine stopped being a bodybuilding supplement and became a kitchen-table topic. Teenagers are asking their parents about it. Parents are asking their paediatricians about it. And coaches (who never signed up to be nutrition counsellors) are fielding questions they were never trained to answer.

The problem isn't that creatine is dangerous. It's that most of what people think they know about it hasn't been updated since the early 2000s.

At our most recent Jenerise Creatine Education Webinar, exercise physiologist Dr Blaise Collins walked our audience through what the current research actually shows about creatine use in adolescents… not the version that circulated during the Mark McGwire era, but the version backed by more than 1,000 peer-reviewed studies and, more recently, adolescent-specific data spanning years and thousands of young athletes. As someone who spends most of my working life trying to separate creatine fact from creatine folklore, I wanted to pull out what I think matters most for the parents, coaches, and clinicians navigating this conversation right now.

First, the myth-busting; because it's overdue

Dr Collins traced the origin of most creatine myths back to a specific moment: the media panic that surrounded performance-enhancing drugs in the late 1990s, which lumped creatine (a molecule the body already produces naturally) in with substances it has nothing to do with. Creatine is not a steroid. It doesn't stunt growth. It isn't linked to hair loss. And the loading phase so many people assume is mandatory is, at best, optional.

What creatine actually does is far less dramatic than the myths suggest: it helps regenerate ATP, the molecule your muscles use for quick bursts of energy. That's it. It's not a stimulant, and for young athletes expecting the jolt of a pre-workout, that can actually make it harder to tell whether it's working… even when it is.

Second (and this is the one I'd ask every parent to actually read the research on) is kidney health

This is the single most common concern Dr Collins hears from physicians, and it's rooted in a real but frequently misunderstood mechanism. Creatine naturally converts to creatinine, which is the same biomarker doctors use to estimate kidney function. So when a young athlete starts supplementing creatine, their creatinine levels go up, and that number alone can look alarming if it's the only thing being measured.

But an isolated creatinine reading doesn't tell the whole story. Dr Collins pointed to a 2025 study that found no meaningful decline in kidney function despite the expected creatinine increase, and to a seven-year Australian study (source article) following roughly 12,000 young athletes with no adverse kidney or cardiometabolic outcomes. His practical guidance for families navigating this with a physician: ask for a fuller picture (cystatin C, blood urea nitrogen, blood pressure, and hydration status) rather than relying on a single number in isolation.

Third: this is a conversation, not a verdict.

One question we get constantly at Jenerise is what to do when a parent wants to support their young athlete's interest in creatine, but their doctor pushes back. Dr Collins' framing here stuck with me: the healthcare provider-patient isn't meant to be a gatekeeping exercise; it's a decision-making alliance. The health care professional brings clinical insight; the family makes the decision. If a provider's concerns seem to be rooted in outdated assumptions, a second opinion (and a full workup rather than a flat "No.") is a reasonable next step.

Fourth: dosage is simpler than the internet makes it sound.

Despite the wide range of protocols circulating online, the research is fairly consistent: 3 to 5 grams per day, taken consistently, is enough to saturate muscle stores over roughly two weeks. Some regimens front-load with a week of higher doses. Still, Dr Collins was clear that this isn't necessary to see results, and there's no meaningful benefit to exceeding recommended amounts. Cycling on and off isn't required either; daily, consistent, moderate intake is the through-line across the literature.

Finally, the research is heading somewhere bigger than sports

Perhaps the most striking part of Dr Collins' presentation wasn't about athletes at all, but about the broader adolescent population. Creatine is increasingly being studied for potential benefits in Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's disease, depression, and women's health… a far cry from its reputation as a locker-room supplement. It's a reminder that the compound so many of us grew up being warned about is now being explored as a tool across nearly every stage of life.

Why this matters beyond the science

None of this means every young athlete needs creatine, or that supplementation should come before sleep, nutrition, and training fundamentals; it shouldn't, and our other speakers made that case well. But it does mean the conversation happening in homes, locker rooms, and healthcare providers' offices right now is too often working from a decades-old script. Young athletes deserve better information than what a TikTok algorithm or a forum thread from 2004 is going to give them.

That's the gap we started Jenerise to close… not by telling families what to decide, but by making sure the decision is grounded in the science as it actually stands today, not as it was misunderstood twenty years ago.

We all rise together,

Rachael Jennings | Co-Founder + CBO, Jenerise

More from Dr Blaise on the Jenerise blog