NicoleRaleigh said:

Worth stating the units and the reference range whenever you post a number here.

Filing a mild objection. Mild because I might be wrong; an objection because nobody has addressed the case that does not fit. I think the framing smuggles in the conclusion. Ask it the other way round and the obvious answer reverses, which usually means the question is doing the work.

NicoleRaleigh said:

Worth stating the units and the reference range whenever you post a number here.

That is right for the common case. Whether it is right for the case being asked about depends on a detail that has not been given.

NicoleRaleigh said:

Worth stating the units and the reference range whenever you post a number here.

Bookmarking. The distinction being drawn above is the one nobody else makes. Adding it to my notes with a link back to this thread.

Clinical perspective, offered as context rather than as advice. The honest answer is that the effect is real, the magnitude is contested, and the individual variation is larger than either. Those three things can all be true at once, and most arguments here are two people holding different parts of that.

Happy to go further on any of that.

OP back with an update, since a thread like this is useless without one.

Closing the loop. The answer turned out to depend on the detail I had left out of the opening post, which is a lesson about how to ask rather than about the subject.