Browse the evidence

Extending the dose-escalation period or temporarily suspending dose increases when gastrointestinal adverse events occur improves tolerability and treatment persistence without compromising long-term efficacy.

If you feel sick after a dose increase, don't rush to the next one. Stay at the current dose for a few extra weeks or pause until you feel better. This helps your body adjust and keeps you on the medication longer.

Pharmacological management of persistent nausea with domperidone (preferred over metoclopramide) or other anti-emetics/prokinetics is an effective strategy for managing GLP-1 RA-induced nausea when dietary and titration strategies fail.

If diet changes aren't enough, ask your doctor about domperidone. It is often preferred over other anti-nausea drugs because it has fewer serious side effects. Use it as needed for nausea.

In elderly men, lower relative skeletal muscle mass (RASM) is associated with narrower bones, thinner cortices, and decreased bending strength (section modulus), as well as impaired balance and an increased risk of falls.

For older men, maintaining muscle mass is crucial for bone strength and balance. Focus on resistance training to preserve muscle, as this supports bone geometry (width and cortical thickness) and reduces fall risk, even if bone density measurements alone don't tell the whole story.

Inadequate sleep generates substantial economic costs through productivity losses, healthcare expenditures, and accident-related damages, with total financial and nonfinancial costs in Australia estimated at $45.21 billion for 2016-2017.

Inadequate sleep is not just a personal health issue but a major economic burden. The financial costs include healthcare, productivity losses, and accidents, while nonfinancial costs include reduced well-being. Prioritizing sleep is crucial for both individual health and societal economic stability.

Mindfulness experienced during work promotes psychological detachment from work in the evening, which mediates the relationship with subsequent sleep quality.

To improve your sleep, focus on being fully present and non-judgmental during your work tasks. This 'mindfulness at work' helps you mentally disconnect from work issues in the evening (psychological detachment), which directly leads to better sleep quality. You do not need a formal meditation session; simply paying attention to the present moment while working can facilitate this recovery process.

High trait mindfulness stabilizes psychological detachment levels across the work week, preventing the systematic decline seen in low-mindfulness individuals.

If you find your ability to mentally disconnect from work gets worse as the week progresses, cultivating mindfulness during work hours can help stabilize your detachment levels. High mindfulness prevents the typical weekly decline in detachment, keeping your recovery capacity more consistent from Monday to Friday.

The Chinese Visceral Adiposity Index (CVAI) provides a more accurate assessment of visceral fat dysfunction and metabolic risk than BMI or waist circumference in Chinese adults, particularly for identifying metabolically unhealthy normal-weight individuals.

If you are Asian or Chinese, do not rely on BMI or waist circumference alone to judge your metabolic health. Use a calculated index (CVAI) that includes your BMI, waist circumference, and blood lipid levels (Triglycerides and HDL). This is especially critical if you have a 'normal' weight but feel metabolically unwell, as you may have high visceral fat that BMI misses.

Polyphenols can modulate the gut microbiota composition (acting as prebiotics) by promoting the growth of beneficial bacteria like Lactobacilli and Bifidobacteria, while inhibiting others through antimicrobial activity.

Eating polyphenol-rich foods like berries, tea, or cocoa can help feed good gut bacteria (Lactobacilli and Bifidobacteria) and suppress bad ones, improving your gut ecosystem.

Menopausal hormone therapy (MHT), specifically estrogen, initiated in women aged 60 or younger or within 10 years of menopause, significantly reduces coronary heart disease and all-cause mortality.

If you are a healthy woman under 60 or within 10 years of menopause, discuss estrogen therapy with your doctor. It may reduce your risk of heart disease and death, contrary to older general warnings. This benefit does not apply if you are older than 60 or many years past menopause.

Menopausal hormone therapy (MHT) reduces the risk of developing type 2 diabetes and improves diabetes control, primarily by reducing central adiposity and increasing insulin sensitivity.

MHT may help prevent type 2 diabetes in postmenopausal women by improving insulin sensitivity and reducing abdominal fat. However, this benefit only lasts while you are taking the therapy.

Menopausal hormone therapy (MHT) prevents osteoporosis-related fractures when initiated in the 'window of opportunity' (before age 60 or within 10 years of menopause).

If you are a healthy woman under 60 or within 10 years of menopause, MHT (specifically CEE 0.625 mg daily) is effective for preventing bone fractures. Ensure you also get enough calcium and Vitamin D and do weight-bearing exercise.

Vitamin C supplementation (500 mg/day for 8 weeks) increases baseline antioxidant enzyme (SOD, catalase) and heat shock protein (HSP60, HSP70) levels in lymphocytes and skeletal muscle, thereby attenuating the adaptive upregulation of these proteins in response to oxidative stress.

Taking 500 mg of Vitamin C daily for two months raises your baseline antioxidant levels and stress proteins in blood cells and muscle. This means your body starts with higher protection, but may not ramp up these defenses as much when you exercise or face oxidative stress. For general health, this may be beneficial; for maximizing specific exercise adaptations, it might alter the signaling process.

Moderate-intensity, high-volume resistance training significantly improves insulin sensitivity in nonobese NIDDM patients without altering maximal oxygen uptake (VO2max).

If you have type 2 diabetes and are not obese, performing resistance training 5 days a week for 4-6 weeks using moderate weights with higher repetitions (10-20 reps) can significantly improve how your body handles insulin. You do not need to lose weight or improve your cardiovascular endurance (VO2max) to see these metabolic benefits.

Elevated BMI (overweight and obesity) is associated with a significantly increased risk of developing type 2 diabetes mellitus and its complications (cardiovascular, cerebrovascular, renal, ocular, and lower extremity) in US older adults, with risk increasing progressively as BMI rises.

For older adults, maintaining a healthy weight is crucial to prevent diabetes and its complications. Even being slightly overweight (BMI 25-27.49) increases the risk, especially for women. Weight management through diet and physical activity can help delay or prevent the onset of diabetes and its associated health issues.

Telephone counseling is a cost-efficient alternative to face-to-face counseling for long-term weight management, with similar efficacy but lower program and participant costs.

If you are choosing between telephone and in-person counseling for weight maintenance, consider that telephone counseling offers similar weight loss maintenance benefits at a lower cost. This is particularly beneficial if travel costs or time are barriers. The key is consistent contact and adherence to behavioral strategies, which can be achieved effectively via phone.

Dietary interventions that specifically increase n-6 polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) without simultaneously increasing n-3 PUFA increase the risk of non-fatal myocardial infarction and coronary heart disease (CHD) death compared to mixed n-3/n-6 PUFA interventions.

If you are replacing saturated fats with polyunsaturated fats, ensure you are also increasing your intake of n-3 fatty acids (like those found in fish or flaxseed) rather than just increasing n-6 fatty acids (like corn or soybean oil). Relying solely on n-6 oils for heart health may actually increase your risk of heart attacks and coronary death.

Endurance and resistance exercise training lowers plasma BCAA levels and enhances BCAA oxidation, serving as a natural strategy to mitigate BCAA-related insulin resistance.

Engage in regular endurance and resistance training. This naturally lowers circulating BCAA levels and improves their oxidation, helping to counteract insulin resistance. You don't need extreme protocols; consistent training is effective.

Individualized dietary advice to lower blood total cholesterol in free-living subjects produces a modest reduction of approximately 5.3% after six months, with more intensive diets achieving greater reductions (up to 8.5% at 3 months).

To lower cholesterol, individualized dietary advice works, but the effect is modest (around 5%) in real-world settings due to adherence issues. More intensive diets (Step 2: <7% saturated fat, <200mg cholesterol) are significantly more effective than basic Step 1 diets. Focus on reducing saturated fats and increasing polyunsaturated fats, and recognize that consistent, moderate changes are better than none, even if they don't achieve the 10-15% reductions seen in controlled metabolic ward studies.

Vitamin A and Vitamin D supplementation can improve intestinal barrier function and reduce inflammation in patients with Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD).

If you have IBD, discuss Vitamin D supplementation (e.g., 2000 IU/day) with your doctor. Evidence suggests it may help improve gut permeability and reduce inflammation markers like CRP.

Repeated bouts of eccentric exercise induce cellular adaptations that attenuate serum creatine kinase (CK) release and force deficits in subsequent bouts, while simultaneously increasing the activity of the ubiquitin-proteasome proteolytic pathway.

If you perform heavy eccentric exercises (like lowering weights slowly), your body adapts to the stress. The second time you do the same workout, you will experience less muscle damage (lower enzyme leakage into blood) and recover strength faster. This adaptation is driven by your body increasing the efficiency of its internal protein recycling systems (ubiquitin-proteasome pathway).

EPA supplementation (1-3 g/day) improves symptoms in various psychiatric disorders including depression, bipolar disorder, and schizophrenia, whereas DHA alone shows no effect on depression in tested trials.

If you are managing a psychiatric condition, discuss EPA supplementation (1-3g/day) with your doctor. The evidence suggests EPA is effective for mood disorders, whereas DHA alone has not shown similar benefits for depression. Note that very high doses of EPA (>=4g/day) may be less effective than moderate doses.

Self-reported energy intake significantly underestimates actual energy expenditure, with the magnitude of under-reporting increasing with body weight and adiposity.

Do not rely on self-reported food logs to determine your actual calorie intake, especially if you are overweight. These logs systematically underestimate intake by 20-50% in obese individuals. Use objective measures like body weight trends or doubly labelled water (if available) instead of self-reports for research or precise clinical assessment.

Biomarkers of nutrition provide an objective, proximal measure of dietary intake and metabolic status, overcoming the inherent biases and limitations of self-reported dietary assessment methods.

To accurately assess your nutrition, rely on objective biomarkers (like blood or urine tests) rather than just self-reported food logs. Self-reporting is prone to memory errors and bias. Biomarkers offer a precise, proximal measure of what you actually consume and how your body metabolizes it, enabling better personalized dietary recommendations.

Specific biomarkers exist for various food groups and nutrients, such as alkylresorcinols for whole grains, carotenoids for fruits/vegetables, and DHA/EPA for fish intake, allowing for objective validation of dietary intake.

Objective biomarkers can validate your dietary intake. For example, blood levels of alkylresorcinols can confirm whole grain consumption, while DHA/EPA levels reflect fish intake. These tools help ensure you are meeting your nutritional goals accurately.