Research review priorities
Supplement research priorities
These are research priorities, not recommendations. We selected decisions where public interest, plausible benefit, evidence maturity, and safety stakes make a careful synthesis especially useful.
- priority dossiers
- 148
- claim-level questions
- 444
- study extraction underway
- 148
01 / PRIORITY
How priorities were selected
Priority reflects relevance to healthy aging, frequency of real-world use, maturity of human evidence, the cost of a wrong decision, and the need to separate a valid narrow use from broader marketing claims. It does not rank efficacy or imply that everyone should take the product.
02 / EXTRACTION
What happens next
For every question, we screen the PubMed candidate set, connect multiple publications from the same trial, extract population, dose, comparator, duration, outcomes, harms, and funding, then synthesize supportive, mixed, negative, and safety findings together.
Only screened studies enter audited study and participant totals. Search-result counts and the papers listed here as questions never become evidence by themselves.Bitter melon
- Review stage
- Extracting studies
- audited research papers
- 1
Why this is a research priority
Recent conservative pooled analyses find no metabolic benefit, with short, underpowered, formulation-variable trials.
Questions being reviewed
- Does a standardized bitter melon preparation improve HbA1c beyond placebo and standard care?
- Are weight, lipid, or blood-pressure effects reproducible and clinically meaningful?
- What hypoglycemia, favism, liver, fertility, pregnancy, pediatric, and medicine limits apply?
Milk thistle
- Review stage
- Extracting studies
- audited research papers
- 1
Why this is a research priority
Lower liver enzymes have not been shown to improve histology or patient-important liver outcomes, and products vary.
Questions being reviewed
- Does standardized silymarin improve liver histology or fibrosis rather than enzymes alone?
- Does milk thistle reduce cirrhosis, decompensation, transplantation, or mortality?
- What ragweed allergy, liver-disease, CYP, diabetes-drug, oncology, pregnancy, and contamination limits apply?
Artichoke leaf extract
- Review stage
- Extracting studies
- audited research papers
- 1
Why this is a research priority
Modest short-term lipid changes are surrogate outcomes and do not establish cardiovascular benefit or medication equivalence.
Questions being reviewed
- Which standardized artichoke leaf extract produces durable, clinically meaningful LDL reduction?
- Do lipid changes reduce cardiovascular events or safely add to statin therapy?
- What gallstone, bile-duct, ragweed allergy, liver, medicine, and pregnancy limits apply?
Black seed (Nigella sativa)
- Review stage
- Extracting studies
- audited research papers
- 1
Why this is a research priority
Short-term blood-pressure changes vary by powder versus oil and lack long-term clinical outcome evidence.
Questions being reviewed
- Does standardized Nigella sativa sustainably lower ambulatory blood pressure as add-on care?
- Are glucose and lipid effects reproducible and linked to fewer complications?
- What bleeding, glucose, blood-pressure, kidney, liver, surgery, pregnancy, and oil-quality limits apply?
Spirulina
- Review stage
- Extracting studies
- audited research papers
- 1
Why this is a research priority
Blood-pressure estimates come from five small short trials, while contamination and product identity are central to real-world safety.
Questions being reviewed
- Does independently tested spirulina meaningfully lower ambulatory blood pressure?
- Do lipid and glucose changes translate into patient-important outcomes?
- What microcystin, heavy-metal, microbial, phenylketonuria, immune, medicine, and pregnancy limits apply?
03 / SOURCES
Research standards
The review begins with federal evidence summaries and PubMed records, then moves to trial-level extraction. Product claims or another publisher’s evidence grade are not copied into the ledger.