My lifetime goal is to help humankind to live longer, delay the onset of age-related disease, and improve quality of life. Very early in my professional career, I learned that to do that we need to know what is happening inside our bodies. The best indicator for that is blood analysis, as it reflects the current status of our organs and body systems.
How InsideTracker selected what biomarkers to measure
InsideTracker measures up to 43 different biomarkers. When I was selecting what biomarkers to include I wanted to make sure that they:
- Are most relevant for a healthy person looking to improve his or her health and performance;
- Are common markers of health and wellness for most healthy people. I was not looking for markers where just one out of one million people is optimized; and
- Are actionable and can be modulated by food, supplements, exercise, and lifestyle changes.
Development of the optimal zones
My next task was to develop an optimal zone for each biomarker. The rationale was simple: before InsideTracker, all of us had the same normal zone for specific markers, regardless of if you were male or female, old or young, active or sedentary, and so on.
InsideTracker developed the optimal zone by extracting relevant information from peer-reviewed scientific publications about specific populations in relationship to specific markers. For example, the normal zone for ferritin for females is above 12, but young athletic females might need more iron due to monthly iron loss with the menstrual cycle and exercise that depletes iron levels. That is why the optimal zone for ferritin for that population is greater than 12.
The second method of developing the optimal zones was by using a large database of hundreds of thousands of data points from the American population that includes demographic information like age, gender, ethnicity, athletic activity, and so on that are connected to those biomarkers. This mega-database allowed us to find the zone in which the majority of your peers’ levels fall.
We use a mix of these two methods to calculate the optimal zone for each of our customers.
The most up-to-date references
Since InsideTracker's creation, the optimal zones have been updated. We decided that we needed to re-evaluate the validity of each marker’s optimal zone in order to provide our customers with the most innovative information possible. To do that, we significantly expanded the size of the population database and in addition, we reviewed all of the rules extracted from the peer-reviewed scientific publications and updated them based on newer, more cutting-edge research. One area we specifically focused on was the impact of specific markers on the aging process and how that affects the optimal level for you. Our goal is to provide personalized, powerful, and practical information to each customer, allowing you to live longer and delay the onset of age-related disease.
InsideTracker will continue to evaluate the data and adjust optimal zones we applicable to give our customers the most precise, and personalized information possible.
