alt Hacker NewsThis is a myth, its not bad for your kidneys. The reason this gets spread is because you will have higher levels of creatine in your urine if your Doctor tests your urine for kidney function, which indicates kidney disease.
However, If you reveal to that doctor that you're supplementing Creatine it will not be concern them.
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I've even had doctors unaware that the regular eGFR tests needs to be adjusted for body mass to be remotely accurate if you're bigger than average - e.g. lifting weights or obese. Couple that with creatine and you get some "fun" moments when your doctor tries to gently break to you how messed up they think your kidneys are. The first time I had that I'd warned my doctor ahead of time to expect elevated creatinine, and he still freaked out.
Creatinine not Creatine
Careful.
Creatine metabolizes into creatinine which is major indicator of kidney function because not being able to clear creatinine means your kidneys aren’t working. Adding more creatinine to your system decreases your ability to clear it leading to fatigue, edema, high blood pressure etc.
So it isn’t bad for your kidneys: it is bad for everything else.
This has been my understand as well. I have CKD and my doctors have always been chill about it as long as I stop taking it about a week before having blood work done.
EDIT: I don't do 25g though... sounds like a lot...
At the risk of sounding stupid. Doesn’t this mean it would mask actual kidney disease? So you’d be ignoring potential warning signs.
My dad's GP didn't know about this, and despite my dad saying "it's fine, I'm taking creatine", sent him for a kidney check-up. Then they found an unrelated tumor on the ultrasound. Seems to be benign and hopefully all will be well. If so, creatine saved his life ;)