Editorial policy

Our editorial mission

We publish honest, citation-backed editorial on metabolic health for adults who have tried diets that didn't work and want to understand why. Our editorial position is shaped by the peer-reviewed literature, not by industry funding or cultural movements. We'll change our position when better evidence appears.

How content is researched

Every claim about health outcomes in our content is supported by at least one peer-reviewed citation. Our citation database currently holds 109 entries spanning ultra-processed food, metabolic adaptation, GLP-1 drugs, insulin resistance, fasting, seed oils, ancestral diets, sleep and circadian rhythm, exercise, women-specific health, gut microbiome, protein leverage, heart disease, blood glucose variability, and cortisol/stress.

We prioritize:

• Randomized controlled trials over observational studies
• Meta-analyses and systematic reviews over individual studies
• Recent literature (last 10 years) over older work, except for foundational papers
• PubMed-indexed sources over preprint or popular-press summaries

Browse the full library at /research.

Citation policy

Every health-outcomes claim in our editorial content cites at least one peer-reviewed source. We use inline footnote markers throughout articles, with the full reference list at the bottom of every page.

We mark each citation with an evidence-quality grade:

• Strong evidence — high-quality RCTs or meta-analyses with consistent findings
• Moderate evidence — RCT or large cohort with moderate consistency
• Emerging — recent or limited evidence; further research likely to refine the conclusion
• Contested — the literature genuinely disagrees; reasonable experts read the same evidence differently
• Mechanism only — supported by biological mechanism but lacking large clinical trials in humans

When we discuss contested topics — seed oils, saturated fat, carbohydrate restriction at the extremes — we present the evidence on both sides and clearly flag where our editorial position is a judgment call rather than settled science.

Editorial voice

We aim for “serious, cited, not selling magic, not selling fear.” The editorial voice should sound like a friend who happens to be a metabolic researcher and refuses to lie to make you feel better. Specifically:

• We don't use motivational platitudes. We respect readers' intelligence.
• We don't hype products beyond what the evidence supports. We don't use breathless “everything you knew was wrong” framings.
• We don't claim our protocols “cure”, “reverse”, or “treat” disease. We use “may help”, “research suggests”, “associated with”.
• We acknowledge what conventional advice gets right when it does (Mediterranean diet, sleep, resistance training all have strong evidence and we say so).
• We name what conventional advice gets wrong with the receipts (1977 dietary guidelines, the “a calorie is a calorie” oversimplification, the breakfast-is-most-important-meal myth).

Conflicts of interest

Our revenue comes from:

• Paid program enrollments (The Ancestral Reset, $129 one-time)
• Subscription memberships (Inner Circle, $19/mo or $179/yr)
• Affiliate commissions on products we recommend — see our affiliate disclosure

We do not:

• Take supplement-brand sponsorship for editorial content
• Run programmatic advertising
• Accept payment for placement of products in our reviews or recommendations
• Sell user data to third parties
• Promote specific medical providers, clinics, or pharmacies

Review process

Articles tagged with health claims are reviewed by our medical-content reviewers before publication. See our medical review page for current reviewer credentials.

Tools (the calculators) are reviewed for formula accuracy by appropriately-credentialed consultants before launch and at major revision.

We re-review long-form articles at least annually for date-sensitive content (drug approvals, recent-trial results, regulatory changes) and update where needed.

Correction policy

We make mistakes. When we do:

• Substantive errors — incorrect citations, mathematical errors in tools, factual misstatements about studies — we correct in place and add a dated correction note at the bottom of the article.
• Minor errors — typos, formatting — we fix without notation.
• Updated evidence — when new research substantially changes our editorial position, we update the article and note the change with a dated revision.

Spot an error? Email research@sureshotfatloss.com. Substantive corrections include a credit to the contributor.

Editorial independence

Our editorial team makes content decisions independently of our commercial team. Affiliate partners do not see content before publication and have no influence over what we write about their products. We've declined to participate in affiliate programs whose products we don't recommend.

Use of AI in content production

We use AI tools (LLMs, transcription) to assist with research synthesis, draft organization, and citation lookup. All AI-assisted content is subject to human editorial review before publication. We don't publish AI-generated content without verification of every cited claim against the underlying source.

Reporting concerns

Concerns about our editorial integrity, undisclosed conflicts of interest, or factual accuracy: editorial@sureshotfatloss.com.