Urine creatinine normal range

Creatine is amino acid mainly found in the muscles and there it is responsible for production of energy. This energy can be used either for the growth of the muscles or for any of the movements specific muscles need to perform. There is a limited amount of creatine in the body, so it shouldn’t surprise anyone that body builders use creatine supplements in order to grow their muscles even bigger. As any other substance creatine is metabolized in human body. Waste product of creatine metabolism is known as creatinine. Under normal circumstances, most of this substance gets filtrated in the kidneys and excreted through urine, but a small amount remains in the blood.

How Much Creatinine is Normal?

To estimate amount of creatinine in the urine, the patient will be asked to collect all excreted urine for 24 hours. When there is about 500 to 2.000mg of creatinine in that 24 hour sample of urine, doctors usually consider this as normal range of creatinine.

However, age and sex have significant impact to amount of creatinine in urine and children and adults are definitively going to have different results. Level of creatinine also depends on the gender of a patient and woman and a man of approximately same age will have different results of creatinine urine test. Since men normally have more muscle tissue, it is not unusual to notice significant change in the amount of creatinine in urine as well. You should know that aging normally decreases the level of creatinine in the blood and consequently in the 24hours urine sample. Muscle mass is proven to decrease over the years. Additionally, human body can’t store the same amount of creatinine after some time. Fewer muscles and lack of creatinine storage leads to decreased level of creatinine in urine at older age.

Abnormal Results

Normal amount of creatinine in urine won’t cause any alarm or be a reason for further testing, but abnormally high or low results will.

Decreased amount of creatinine in urine is frequently noticed in people who drink a lot of water during the day. Plenty of water may dilute the presence of creatinine and lead to false conclusion that there is something wrong. High concentration of creatinine in the blood and low concentration in urine indicates the problem with the kidneys. These organs may be unable to filter creatinine from the blood because of infection or kidney stone. This condition requires medical treatment for it may be a life threatening problem.