Friday, Jul 24, 2026 The claims desk. Receipts included. POWERED BY LENZ ↗
IsThis

HEALTH

The Claim

Being underweight in men causes a deficiency of dihydrotestosterone (DHT).

Verified by Lenz ·

The Short Version

Available evidence does not show that being underweight in men causes DHT deficiency. Research more commonly associates lower DHT with higher body fat or obesity, while underweight-related studies focus on hypogonadism or testosterone and do not directly demonstrate low DHT. The claim makes a specific causal statement that the cited evidence does not substantiate.

Caveats

  • Underweight status may be associated with hypogonadism or low testosterone in some men, but that is not the same as proven DHT deficiency.
  • Most relevant studies are observational; they do not establish that body weight causes changes in DHT, and the claim offers no direct evidence in underweight men.
  • The phrase "DHT deficiency" is undefined here: no diagnostic cutoff or data show underweight men falling below a recognized DHT reference range.

The Receipts

  1. Body fatness and sex steroid hormone concentrations in US men – Results from NHANES III

    National Center for Biotechnology Information

  2. Radioimmunoassay of plasma dihydrotestosterone in normal men and men with prostate cancer

    PubMed

  3. Plasma steroids, body composition, and fat distribution: effects of age, sex, and exercise training

    PubMed

  4. Metabolism of sex steroids is influenced by acquired adiposity - A study of young adult male monozygotic twin pairs

    PubMed

  5. Serum dihydrotestosterone and testosterone concentrations in HIV-infected men

    PubMed

  6. Dihydrotestosterone

    Wikipedia

  7. Dihydrotestosterone: Biochemistry, Physiology, and Clinical Implications

    PMC

  8. A bi-directional mendelian randomization analysis of the causal relationships between body mass index and serum testosterone

    PubMed

  9. Serum concentrations of dihydrotestosterone are associated with male aging symptoms even when total testosterone is normal

    Università di Roma "La Sapienza" (institutional repository)

  10. Biochemistry, Dihydrotestosterone

    StatPearls - NCBI Bookshelf

+ 26 more sources — see the full list on Lenz

Filed Under

Dihydrotestosterone

More Fact Checks