TUDCA for Liver Health
TUDCA has only a few small, dated trials in people who already have liver disease, and they measured blood markers rather than real outcomes; there is no good evidence it supports general liver health in healthy adults, and major health institutions do not endorse the supplement.
Why this grade7-layer evidence engine
The grade is held to weak (Tier C) because the human evidence is thin, dated, and limited to surrogate markers. Five small trials (1993-2013, n=23-150, about 6 months) studied people with established disease. In cirrhosis (PMID 23592128) and HCV-related hepatitis (PMID 9840118), TUDCA lowered liver enzymes such as ALT, AST and ALP, but no study showed fibrosis reversal or hard outcomes like survival or avoiding transplant.
The results are also inconsistent. In primary biliary cirrhosis, one crossover trial found TUDCA roughly comparable to the approved drug UDCA (PMID 9146783), yet a head-to-head trial found UDCA superior for GGT and better tolerated (PMID 8258267). In neonates, TUDCA failed to prevent parenteral-nutrition-associated cholestasis (PMID 12183720). No trial tested healthy adults, which is the main way consumers use it.
Regulators and clinics reinforce the caution. The FDA notes TUDCA as a bile acid for certain cholestatic diseases, but that reflects the prescription drug UDCA, not the supplement, which has no recognized dietary-ingredient status; EFSA is effectively against a food-supplement framing. Mayo Clinic, Cleveland Clinic, Harvard Health and NIH ODS have no entry endorsing TUDCA for liver health. Crucially, well-established UDCA drug evidence must not be conflated with the far weaker TUDCA-supplement data.
Scoring transparency
All scores computed by a 7-layer evidence engine — fully auditable▸View the full decision path (audit trail)
- compute_raw_score — 加權公式: L2×0.30 + L3×0.25 + L5×0.25 + L11×0.10 + L1×0.10 = 0.455
- tier_from_score — 依分數區間映射至 tier letter
- apply_hec_rules — 無高階證據可裁決
- tier_strict_requirement_check — Tier 條件達標，未降階
- detect_disputes — 偵測到 0 個 hard + 1 個 soft dispute
- decide_status — 依 tier + dispute 結果決定 status