Editorial
Written byMen's Health Istanbul Editorial Team
Medical reviewNot required: this piece gives no medical advice
Key takeaways
- An association between two things is not proof that one causes the other.
- Results in cells or animals often do not translate to people.
- Small, early or unpublished studies need confirming before they change practice.
- Exaggeration in health news often starts in the press release, not only in the newspaper.
We apply these questions to every piece of research we cover in the Man Cave. They work just as well for anything you read elsewhere.
1. Who was studied?
Findings in cells or animals are an important early step, but many never translate to people. Even in human studies, check who took part. A result in young athletes may not apply to men in their sixties with diabetes, and the reverse is true too.
2. How many, and for how long?
Small studies are more likely to produce results that do not hold up. Short studies cannot tell us about long-term benefits or harms. Neither makes a study worthless, but both are reasons for caution.
3. Is it a link or a cause?
Observational studies watch what happens in groups of people. They can show that two things tend to go together, for example that men who sleep less have lower testosterone, but not which one drives the other, or whether a third factor explains both. Randomised controlled trials, where people are allocated to a treatment or a comparison by chance, are much better at showing cause and effect. Good reporting uses language such as "the study found" or "was associated with", not "proves".
4. How big is the effect?
"Doubles the risk" sounds dramatic. If the risk goes from one in 10,000 to two in 10,000, the change for any individual is tiny. Look for absolute numbers, not only relative ones.
5. Has it been published and checked?
Conference presentations and preprints are genuinely useful, but they have not yet been through full peer review, and results sometimes change before publication. One study is rarely the final word; what matters is whether other research points the same way.
6. Who is saying it, and why?
A study published in the BMJ in 2014 found that exaggeration in health news was often already present in the universities' own press releases. Funding and commercial interests are worth noting too, which is why we describe sponsorship and conflicts of interest in our editorial policy.
How we label research
When we report on research, we say clearly whether it is established evidence or early-stage research, and we separate the news from any clinical recommendation. A single new study almost never means you should change your treatment. That is a conversation for you and your own doctor.
References
- Sumner P, Vivian-Griffiths S, Boivin J, et al. The association between exaggeration in health related science news and academic press releases: retrospective observational study. BMJ. 2014;349:g7015. Source
This article is general health information. It does not replace an individual medical consultation, examination or diagnosis. Read our editorial policy and medical review policy.
