Doctors couldn't help. They turned to a shadow system of DIY medical tests.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Doctors couldn’t help. They turned to a shadow system of DIY medical tests.

Buoyed by regulatory vacuums, Silicon Valley is building a booming online wellness market that aims to leave the doctor’s office behind.

By Elizabeth Dwoskin, Daniel Gilbert and Tatum Hunter
June 9, 2024 at 6:02 a.m. EDT



Angelika Sharma at home in Livingston, N.J., with her 3-year-old daughter Annika. Sharma turned to a medical start-up to learn the cause of her daughter's food sensitivities. (Melanie Landsman for The Washington Post)

Angelika Sharma was desperate. An array of basic first foods — from bananas to sweet potatoes — caused her six-month old Annika to vomit uncontrollably, so many times in one night that she landed in the hospital for dehydration.

Half a dozen pediatric specialists largely dismissed her daughter’s ailments, Sharma said, forcing her to leave her job as a hospitality executive, because "you can’t just have any babysitter looking after a child” with such serious reactions to food.

After a year and a half, an answer came finally in the form of a Facebook ad for Tiny Health, a Silicon Valley start-up that could test her baby’s gut microbiome. Using a bead of stool swabbed from a diaper, the company diagnosed the problem: Annika’s gut was overcrowded with P. vulgatus, a common bacteria. A company nutritionist recommended a probiotic, sauerkraut and exposure to animal microbes through daily visits to the petting zoo. … Within months, Annika’s food reactions were normal. More tests showed a gut transformed.



Sharma has a meal with her daughter. (Melanie Landsman for The Washington Post)

A new world of DIY testing is changing the relationship between physicians and patients, allowing people like Sharma to bypass the doctors office and take medical tests on their own. Buoyed by a growing network of independent labs, Silicon Valley start-ups now offer tests for a battery of conditions including menopause, food sensitivity, thyroid function, testosterone levels, ADHD and sexually-transmitted diseases. The growth is fueled by a growing distrust of Big Medicine and confidence in home-testing borne from the Covid pandemic.

{snip}

[bucolic_frolic]

1. Sometimes doctors should simply admit they don't know what's going on

Their overconfidence worries me no end. A once a year 15 minute examination is less attention than my car's inspection.

[niyad]

8. When I was in my early 20's, I developed a very odd skin rash. At first glance,

one might have thought ringworm, as my dr. explained, but said it did not have the actual "ring". He checked everything he could, and then looked at me and said, "I have absolutely no idea what this is. I have never seen anything like it. About the only thing I can suggest is a dermatologist. They might know, but I sure don't."

As he suggested, I made an appointment. But, by the time it finally happened, the rash or whatever it was had gone, so I did not bother. I began to have my suspicions, but it was years before I got confirmation.

[Warpy]

10. I went through six weeks of outpatient tests at Mass. General

for weird problems that were turning life threatening. Finally, they bit the bullet and ordered an expensive handful of tests for autoimmune disease, which finally turned up the problem, although treatments 50 years ago were almost worse than the disease and didn't work all that well.

You've never lived until you've been the subject of a full auditorium of docs, med students and Great Men (TM) all firing questions at you.

Sometimes it'll take docs forfuckingever to diagnose a problem properly.

Studies of intestinal flora are just beginning. For instance, people in the eastern US tend to have a sparse collection of intestinal flora while people in the west have a much wider variety of bugs. People who move back and forth tend to adjust their intestinal flora within a few weeks and nobody knows how or why. It's fascinating, but too little is known to base many adult treatments on lactobacillus, the main probiotic used. Fermented foods are likely better options, since most contain a wider variety of bugs.

[Elessar Zappa]

12. I've also read that

a wide variety of foods in the diet can help the gut biome and reduce overall body inflammation. One thing the article I read recommended was several different veggies a week and bread that was made with multiple kinds of grain. I found a bread that is made using 22 different types of grains so I’ll try that. It’s a bit expensive at $5 a loaf but it’s better than spending the money on junk food.

[Warpy]

15. I don't think paying through the nose for multigrain bread is required

Just try something different now and then, varying wheat bread with rye bread, wheat-oat bread, things like that. Health food stores used to carry a lot of varieties in their freezer section, which is where they need to be kept at home. No preservatives means they seem to grow fungus in a matter of hours if you thaw a whole loaf.

I think not getting into a single grain rut is what's required, really. Exploring breads made with spelt, quinoa, amaranth, teff, or other exotic grains can come as your wallet allows. Some are nice, some are a little weird.

[mitch96]

2. If they can't burn, cut or poison the symptoms they are a bit lost...nt

[infullview]

3. More dirt required...

We have become so germ conscious that we’re causing our kids to have food allergies. COVID has encouraged a lot of this phobic behavior.

[wolfie001]

6. All that hand sanitizer.....

Skin has its own germ-killing properties created by our immune system. Of course, common sense if important. I mean, if you're cooking chicken, etc. Also, I saw a TT about coffee enemas. What!!? Great way to kill your normal, healthy bacteria. Jeeze

[wnylib]

9. Lack of exposure to common microbes might cause

food sensitivities like the infant in the OP, but that's not the same as a food allergy.

Allergies are an immune system overreaction to non-threatening substances - or, to substances that most people do not react to. The allergic person's immune system is unable to distinguish between harmless substances and harmful microbes like bacteria, viruses, fungi. It's an inbuilt biological malfunction issue that they are born with. An allergy develops when they come in contact with something that triggers the immune system's inborn malfunction.

Several parts of the body are involved in immune responses, creating a number of possibilities for malfunctioning immune reactions. Allergies can involve hormones like adrenalin production in the adrenal glands (on top of the kidneys), T cells, macrophages, immunoglobulins (especially IGA and IGE), plus the lymph system and immune cells in the skin.

Specific allergies are not inherited, but immune system problems that cause allergies to develop are heritable, which is why being allergic often runs in families. Sometimes the person's immune system turns on its own body causing autoimmune disorders, literally becoming allergic to oneself, or to one or more of the body's own parts.

I was born with immunological functioning issues (the capacity to develop allergies) which manifested shortly after birth in an allergy to cow's milk formula. I am NOT lactose intolerant, which is different from a milk allergy. I also no longer react to cow's milk, fortunately.

As a child, I played in dirt constantly. My father had half our yard planted in vegetables and half in lawn, shrubs, and flowers, so I was exposed to all kinds of pollen, too. In the fall, he uprooted harvested plants, turned over the soil, and let us play in it.

We washed before meals, of course, but did not have antibiotic soaps and the numerous sanitizing products that exist today. But, in spite of all those "dirt" exposures, I developed more and more allergies as I grew. I spent my entire childhood being chronically congested due to living with things that I now know are allergens for me, but which were not diagnosed by doctors in my childhood - a feather pillow, a wool blanket, a real pine tree at Christmas, etc.

I have skin contact allergies, pollen allergies, medicine allergies, and food allergies. So did my mother, although not always to the same substances. My siblings all developed allergies later in life. As often happens in people with multiple allergies, I also developed an autoimmune disorder in later life. So did my mother and sister.

Rant over. I just get frustrated with the lack of understanding about allergies among many people, even doctors. I had to learn about them but wish that I hadn't needed to.

[58Sunliner]

13. Thank you. Allergies and autoimmune issues are not caused by a lack of dirt or an excess of hand sanitizer.

[wnylib]

14. If course they're not. That's why I get frustrated when I hear people,

including doctors who should know better, saying that the increase in allergies today is due to too many sanitizing products today and not letting kids to play in dirt any more. Those things have zero to do with developing allergies. The capacity to develop allergies is a biological issue that some people are born with.

[mopinko]

4. if it's not gonna kill u, and u arent writhing in pain, drs dont gaf.

even then, they dont want to do shit for someone who knows what they’re talking about.
i have a habit of telling the ppl i pay for services how to do their jobs. it doesnt usually end well. but when it does, it’s great. but no one hates that more than docs.

i’ve been a zebra looking for answers for over 20 yrs. i am absolutely certain i have an autoimmune/genetic disorder. i have a good guess what it is. i have widespread dysfunction, as did my da, and 3 of my 5 kids.
after 2 trips to the er in as many wks, i thought i had gotten their attention.
just saw a new doc. started the convo by telling him i’m a zebra, and hope he has patience w a cranky old zebra. he quoted the med school line that the term is derived from- when u hear hoof beats, think horses, not zebras. but i dont think he ever met 1. young dude.
listened intently, then reneged on a promise to ‘do something substantial for u today’

at 70, i’m getting “it’s unusual to dx ai at your age”. bitch, i’ve been looking for answers since i was 40.
hoping for better luck w a gi this wk, but…

[LymphocyteLover]

5. that's ok to seek outside specialists but caveat emptor

[LiberalArkie]

7. There was a case many years ago (maybe 20) where a mother with twin boys kept one of them indoors

and heavily protected him. The other boy show kept outside, playing in the dirt messing with the neighborhood animals. You know just a boy in the suburbs. The indoor protected boy was always sick and the outdoor boy was generally very healthy except for the usual cuts, scrapes and broken bones.

I do not remember if the parents were doctors or psychologists or what, but to me it just made sense. I guess they were testing which of the 2 ways to raise children was best.

[question everything]

11. Just curious of whether delivery was via C-section.

Normally the first bacteria that inhabit the newborn guts are the beneficial ones from the birth canal.