GQ: Gut Microbiome Tests Promise Full-Body Optimization—Should You Try One?

By Hannah Singleton
March 29, 2024

In nearly any conversation about the U.S. healthcare system, you’ll sense a growing frustration about things like long wait times for appointments, sky-high prescription drug costs, and a lack of focus on preventative care. It’s easy to feel a bit disillusioned—to want to find relief for those nagging symptoms without having a provider tell you that all of your tests came back normal.

This is especially true for hard-to-diagnose issues like gastrointestinal problems. Many people eager for solutions have turned to at-home solutions like gut microbiome tests. Running from $120 to upwards of $350, these kits often use a self-collected stool sample and/or DNA sequencing to provide a detailed analysis of what microbial species are in your gut. Some offer personalized plans based on your results, while others offer diagnostic tools like a gut inflammation analysis to see if you could have irritable bowel syndrome or IBS.

“In the last few years, there has really been an explosion of interest in the microbiome,” says Adam Perlman, MD, former medical director of Mayo Clinic and the chief medical officer of Pendulum Therapeutics, a probiotics company. However, a consideration is that the medical world still understands how the microbiome functions. “It’s like the new frontier of medicine,” he says. “It’s still an area that needs more science, and many conventional physicians still don’t feel very comfortable with it.”

The medical world is certain about one thing though: The microbiome is essential for overall health. It is “very involved in things like brain health, cardiovascular health, endocrine health, and on and on,” says Maya Feller, a registered dietician who works in nutrition education and counseling.

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