Browse evidence-based analysis of health-related claims and assertions
Eating ultra-processed foods can raise your blood pressure because the salt in them makes your body hold onto more fluid, and the sugar causes your insulin levels to spike — together, these push your blood pressure up over time.
When your body becomes resistant to insulin, it makes more insulin to compensate, and that extra insulin can make your kidneys hold onto too much salt, which over time can lead to high blood pressure.
When your body breaks down fructose, it can create more uric acid, which might make your blood vessels less able to relax and widen because of lower levels of a helpful substance called nitric oxide.
When the lining of blood vessels isn't working right and makes less of a substance that keeps vessels open, it can raise blood pressure — even if the heart's pumping and blood amount stay the same.
If your body has too much insulin for a long time, it can make your kidneys hold onto more salt, which increases your blood volume and raises your blood pressure—even if you're not eating too much salt.
Your blood pressure goes up if your heart pumps more blood, if you have more blood in your body, or if your blood vessels become tighter — any one of these can push pressure higher.
Kids with a rare condition called Bardet-Biedl syndrome seem to have problems in a brain-body system that controls sex hormones, which might explain why their testosterone levels are low.
Kids with a rare genetic condition called Bardet-Biedl syndrome have sometimes been found to have a change in the brain area that holds the pituitary gland, which might mean the structure isn't forming normally.
Kids with a rare genetic condition called Bardet-Biedl syndrome sometimes have underactive sex glands, and this might be linked to issues in the brain's hormone control center — meaning their body's hormone system could be involved in how the condition shows up.
New biosensors can now detect tiny amounts of brain chemicals like dopamine and serotonin in lab tests, even when other similar substances are around.
Scientists can use laser light to spot brain chemicals in lab samples, and this method might be a good alternative to older electrical-based techniques.
These tiny sensors, coated with a special material called Nafion, can better detect brain chemicals like dopamine and serotonin in lab tests by keeping out confusing substances that might mess up the results.
Girls might be more affected by certain chemicals early in life when it comes to developing hyperactivity, compared to boys.
When little kids are exposed to higher levels of certain chemicals found in everyday products — especially when many of them are high at once — they’re more likely to show increasing hyperactivity as they grow.
Some chemicals we're exposed to might be linked to hyperactivity in young kids — some could make it more likely, others less, and it depends on the specific chemical.
Kids exposed to several hormone-disrupting chemicals at once are more likely to show high levels of hyperactivity as they grow, with the risk more than doubling compared to lower exposures.
Even though higher levels of plastic chemicals are linked to more impulsive mistakes on tests, doctors don’t see the overall ADHD symptoms as being worse in these kids.
The same plastic chemical that affects impulsivity doesn’t seem to affect how well kids with ADHD notice or remember things they see.
Every time the level of a certain plastic chemical in the urine doubles, kids with ADHD make about eight times more impulsive mistakes on a visual attention test.
Levels of BPA, BPF, and BPS in the urine don’t seem to be linked to how kids with ADHD perform on attention or impulse control tests.
Kids with ADHD who have more of a certain plastic-related chemical in their bodies tend to make more impulsive mistakes when doing visual attention tests, like clicking when they shouldn’t.
In a group of people from Michigan exposed to a chemical called PBB-153, their body levels of this chemical weren’t linked to another similar group of chemicals (PCBs), meaning they’re likely coming from different sources and can be studied separately.
Women in Michigan who were exposed to a chemical called PBB years ago report having ADHD more often than usual—about 1 in 9—so researchers wonder if the exposure might be linked to more ADHD cases or if they're just more aware of it.
Kids who ate contaminated food in the 1970s had much higher levels of a flame retardant in their bodies than babies who were exposed before birth through their mothers.