How We Review
At a Glance
- Health-substantive articles cannot be published without an approved medical reviewer — the publishing system enforces this.
- Reviewers are named publicly with qualification, registration number and, where a public register exists, a verification link.
- Reviewers can decline. Declined articles do not publish.
- Every reviewed article shows a “last reviewed” date, and is re-reviewed annually.
Why review is a blocking step
Most health publications describe medical review as something that happens. Fewer make it something that must happen before the publish button works.
On this site an article in a health-substantive category — nutrition, Ayurveda, remedies, seasonal, sleep, skin and hair, movement, myth-checks — cannot reach published status unless a reviewer has been assigned and their status is “approved”. If that condition is not met the article is held as a draft, with an explanation. There is no override for convenience.
Who reviews what
| Content | Reviewer |
|---|---|
| Ayurveda context, traditional remedies | Ayurvedic physician (BAMS) |
| General health, seasonal, sleep and stress | General physician (MBBS / MD) |
| Nutrition and food content | Registered dietitian or certified nutritionist |
| Skin and hair | Dermatologist (MD) |
What a reviewer checks
- Accuracy. Do the statements match what the cited sources actually say?
- The evidence label. Is it right, and is it the most cautious defensible label? Where reviewer and writer disagree, the more cautious label wins.
- Safety. Are interactions, contraindications, allergy risks, and pregnancy and paediatric cautions present and correct?
- Overclaiming. Does anything imply a treatment effect the evidence does not support, including by omission or by implication rather than by direct statement?
- Signposting. Does the article send readers to a doctor where it should?
Reviewers can say no
A reviewer can decline to approve an article. Declined articles do not publish, and are either rewritten or dropped. Reviewers are paid for their time on a retainer or per-article basis and are not paid more for approving than for declining — an arrangement that would otherwise put a quiet thumb on the scale.
Credentials are real and checkable
Every reviewer is named publicly with their qualification, registration number and issuing council, and where a public register exists we link to their entry so you can check it yourself.
We state the obvious because in this content category it is not obvious: fabricating medical reviewer credentials is fraud, it causes direct reader harm, and a publication that does it has destroyed the only thing that made it worth reading. We will not do it, and if we ever appear to have done it, that is worth reporting to [email protected].
Annual re-review
Evidence moves, links rot, and safety information is updated. Every health-substantive article is re-reviewed annually: labels are re-checked against current literature, safety information updated, broken sources repaired, and the “last reviewed” date refreshed so you can see how current a piece is.
The myth-check exception
Myth-checks are the only articles permitted to quote a prohibited claim, because refuting a claim requires stating it. That exception requires sign-off from both the Editor-in-Chief and a medical reviewer, is logged with a justification, and the quoted claim must sit inside a marked block that renders visually as a claim under examination.
Current status
Medical reviewers have not yet been appointed. Until they are, no health-substantive article can be published on this site — the gate described above is live and blocking. Reviewer recruitment is under way. We would rather publish nothing in those sections than publish unreviewed health content.