The blood work you receive from a physician can be confusing.
It’s typically a list of biomarkers without context. All you learn is whether your results are inside or outside of some mysterious reference range.
Unless you're a clinician, you may not know why your specific biomarkers were tested or what the results mean.
You deserve better. You deserve to know what your biomarkers tell you about your health and how you can use them to reach your goals. That's why InsideTracker created healthspan categories.
Healthspan categories are 10 key areas of health that put your biomarkers into context. They allow you to focus on something you care about—like heart health, inflammation, cognition, or fitness.
Each category includes 6 to 14 blood biomarkers along with data from your fitness tracker. For each one, you'll get a score that lets you quickly analyze the health of that category.
Healthspan categories—and category scores—are a key feature of InsideTracker's platform, and you won't find them anywhere else. With 10 simple numbers, you can see how your blood biomarkers—along with your DNA and fitness tracker data—are affecting your healthspan.
Let's dive into how these numbers can help you live healthier longer.
Why did we create healthspan category scores?
InsideTracker is on a mission to simplify complex health advice. We want to give our members control over their health. And while data is helpful, it can also be overwhelming. It can feel like information overload.
Healthspan category scores make data easy to use. They crunch a huge mess of numbers into 10 simple scores that tell a complete story of your health.
Here’s a closer look at what these scores achieve:
They make your data useful
Healthspan categories help you see how your biomarkers relate to your life. It’s one thing to know you have low iron, but it's another to know how your low iron is affecting your endurance.
This knowledge is key to behavior change. Research shows it's easier to act once you've connected your actions to meaningful outcomes.
They create an accurate picture of your health
The body is complex. It's best to think of it as a network of systems that all function alongside each other. They affect each other, but they're separate.
Healthspan categories acknowledge this truth. They bring together blood biomarkers and physiomarkers (like resting heart rate and sleep) to show how each of your body's systems are functioning.
They show the full impact of each biomarker
Biomarkers rarely serve a single purpose in the body. This is why each biomarker can contribute to multiple healthspan category scores.
Take the stress-hormone cortisol. In addition to your hormone balance, it affects your cognition, gut health, fitness, and sleep. That makes it an important biomarker to work on.
What are the 10 healthspan categories?
Healthspan categories make your data useful. They allow you to set meaningful health goals that go beyond biomarkers.
Here's a deeper breakdown of each one:
Heart health
Heart health refers to the health of your cardiovascular system. This includes your arteries, vessels, and valves. Blood biomarkers of heart health can also indicate your body's ability to transport and clear cholesterol from your body.
Key markers of heart health include apolipoprotein B (ApoB), HDL cholesterol, and resting heart rate.
Metabolism
Your body's metabolism is a set of processes that use energy for the growth, repair, and maintenance of cells, tissues, and organs. A low metabolism score also indicates a higher risk for type 2 diabetes.
Key markers of metabolism include glucose, hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c), insulin, ApoB, and thyroid-stimulating hormone (TSH).
Cognition
Your brain and nerve function contribute to your cognition, which impacts things like reaction time, decision making, and mood. Cognitive biomarkers reveal your ability to focus, process information, and consolidate memories.
Key markers of cognition include cortisol, vitamin B12, and insulin.
Sleep
Among other things, sleep helps your body repair tissue and consolidate memories. Blood biomarkers can impact this process. If your sleep score is low, you may struggle to fall asleep or get the restorative rest you need.
Key markers of your sleep score include magnesium, vitamin D, glucose, deep sleep, and REM sleep.
Hormone balance
Hormones are chemical messengers that signal the start and stop of various biological processes. Hormone balance in both men and women can reflect life stage, stress response, sleep quality, and overall energy.
Key markers of hormone balance include thyroid-stimulating hormone (TSH), sex-hormone binding globulin (SHBG), and cortisol. They also include testosterone for men and dehydroepiandrosterone for women.
Fitness
Fitness refers to the body's ability to perform physical activity. Fitness-related biomarkers reflect energy levels, stress response, efficiency of cellular repair, and overall muscle health.
Key markers of fitness include testosterone, vitamin B12, and step count.
Recovery
Recovery biomarkers provide insight into the body's response to exercise or physical activity.
Key markers of recovery include alanine aminotransferase (ALT), aspartate aminotransferase (AST), and magnesium.
Endurance
Your endurance capacity indicates your ability to sustain cardiovascular and muscular activities. Endurance biomarkers reflect aerobic capacity, energy utilization, oxygen transport, and stamina.
Key markers of endurance include ferritin, hemoglobin, and vitamin B12.
Inflammation
Inflammation describes your body's ability to protect and respond to foreign substances. These include pathogens, infections, viruses, and lifestyle stressors—like too much or too little exercise or sleep.
Key markers of inflammation include high-sensitivity C-reactive protein (hsCRP), vitamin D, and white blood cell count.
Gut health
Your gut health reflects the abundance and diversity of microbes in your gut microbiome. Biomarkers impact—and are impacted by—the gut microbiome. And the gut microbiome affects many of the body's systems and processes.
Key markers of gut health include cortisol, glucose, and hsCRP.
How are healthspan category scores calculated?
Markers are weighted based on their impact
Healthspan category scores include both biomarkers and fitness-tracker physiomarkers.
Biomarkers are weighted based on their respective impact on the category. This is determined by InsideTracker scientists after a complete review of the research.
As an example, significant scientific evidence connects blood glucose levels to your metabolism. Total cholesterol also has an impact on metabolism, but there's less evidence to support it. So when it comes to your metabolism score, glucose has a greater contribution than total cholesterol.
InsideTracker members can see a full breakdown of how their healthspan category scores are calculated. While looking at your scores, click into any specific category and scroll down for more information.
Biomarker zones determine contribution
Each score is also weighted according to how close each biomarker is to the "optimal" zone. If your biomarker is optimized, it will have a better impact on your category score.
For background on zones, each marker on the InsideTracker platform is classified as optimal, normal, high, or low. “Normal” is what a physician would consider “clinically healthy” based on a reference range for a general population.
InsideTracker's zones are more dynamic. There are more of them, for starters. But they're also personalized based on your age, sex, ethnicity, and activity level.
Recent results are required for accurate scores
All healthspan category scores are calculated based on your most recent biomarker results. In addition, every category contains "required markers," meaning you must have them to receive a score.
If your most recent results are missing markers, results from previous tests are used in your score. However, we can only substitute results from previous tests if they were measured within 90 days of your most recent result.
How are healthspan category scores displayed?
Healthspan category scores are displayed as numbers, with the max being 100. Each numerical range also includes a descriptive label: optimal, good, fair, or needs work.
If a healthspan category score comes back as “needs work,” aim to prioritize improvement in this area first.
How can you improve a healthspan category score?
If a healthspan category score is under 100, you’ll see a mix of nutrition, supplement, lifestyle, and exercise recommendations to improve it.
These recommendations are backed by clinical research on people like you. They represent the most reliable strategies for improving your health.
If you follow these recommendations, you should see your category score improve. This is exactly what you want. It means you’re on track to living a longer, healthier life.
Healthspan category overview
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Biomarker data can be incredibly valuable, but it can also be overwhelming and difficult to understand.
- Healthspan category scores are a game-changing way to interpret your blood and fitness-tracker data.
- These scores are linked to the most important components of healthspan, and they provide the context you need to meet your goals quickly.
- An InsideTracker Membership will reveal your healthspan category scores. Our platform can teach you how to extend your lifespan, so you can do what you love for longer.
