Tag: genetic testing
Everlywell: At-Home Lab Tests That Don’t Make Sense
EverlyWell offers 34 at-home tests for everything from IgG tests for food sensitivities to a Sleep and Stress test. Most of them make no sense and are likely to mislead customers.
Can DNA testing predict your response to drugs?
Can your genes really predict how you will metabolize certain medications? The FDA has approved the first direct-to-consumer test that claims to do this. How meaningful are the findings?
“Dr. Amy” Yasko’s Autism Protocol: Unproven, Complicated and Expensive
"Dr. Amy" Yasko isn't a real doctor and her autism protocol is unproven, complicated, and expensive. Her claims of success are contradicted by autism, nutrition, and genetics experts.
Cleveland Clinic genetic experts call out functional medicine on worthless genetic testing and supplement prescribing
Cleveland Clinic genetics experts call out functional medicine on worthless genetic testing and dietary supplement prescribing: "Poor science, leading to even worse medicine." Irony meters exploded everywhere.
Genetic Testing: Does Knowing Risk of Disease Make a Difference?
The complete sequencing of the human genome by the Human Genome Project was a remarkable accomplishment and a cause for celebration. Several companies including 23andMe, Navigenics, and deCODE have capitalized on that scientific achievement by offering genomic testing directly to the public. They promise more than they can deliver, and consumers don’t understand the limitations of the test results. The subject has...
Genomic testing at your pharmacy: Ready for prime time?
Despite science’s ability to develop sophisticated and targeted new drugs, predicting the effect of a drug in an individual is still maddeningly difficult. Not every drug works for everyone that takes it. Similarly, the very same drug can be well tolerated in some, but can cause intolerable side effects in others. So-called “targeted therapies” were supposed to improve our accuracy, by focusing...
Precision Medicine: The Coolest Part of Medicine
One size rarely fits all. Most medical knowledge is derived from studying groups of subjects, subjects who may be different in some way from the individual who walks into the doctor’s office. Basing medicine only on randomized controlled studies can lead to over-simplified “cookbook” medicine. A good clinician interprets study results and puts them into context, considering the whole patient and using...
And Now for Something Completely Different
This will be a departure from my usual posts. Several announcements in the news and medical journals have caught my attention recently, and as I delved into the details, I thought I would share them with our SBM readers. Topics include AIDS cures, the continuing danger of polio, eating nuts for longevity, racial differences in vitamin D, and the use of pharmacogenetic...
Meet Your Microbes: uBiome Offers New Service
We are not alone. Walt Whitman didn’t know how right he was when he said, “I contain multitudes.” The microbes on and in our bodies outnumber our own cells 10:1. Perhaps that creeps you out. Perhaps that makes you curious to know just who all these billions of creatures are that are using your body for a home and a transportation device....