
Review: 23andMe DNA Testing for Health, Disease & Ancestry - PStamatiou
http://paulstamatiou.com/review-23andme-dna-testing-for-health-disease-ancestry
======
rfreytag
My first job out of college was with a startup that did health risk
assessments. Part of this involved the use of new genetic markers for disease.
This was decades ago (yes before the Internet even!) so it was early days for
genetic testing. We had an expert system that put a questionnaire in front of
customers and charged them for the resulting recommendations and any tests we
did.

Two 'hot' technologies of the time: expert systems and genetic testing.

We learned:

1\. people want >answers< not statistical results.

2\. people told they have a significant probability of a disease get unhappy.
Do that enough times someone gets unhappy enough to sue. So your follow-up
debriefings have to be done carefully and in person - very expensive.

The lawyers that ran the company did not see the cost of lawsuits, on top of
the high cost and error rates for genetic testing at the time, as a deal
breaker going in.

Good to see 23andMe make what looks like a better attempt at this market.

------
PStamatiou
Some great conversation on Louis Gray's Buzz, including a comment by the
23andMe co-founder:

"This is one of the most thorough and accurate summaries I've seen (I'm the
co-founder of 23andMe). One small point...the testing technology 23andMe uses
is highly accurate, it's just the interpretation of what the datapoints means
which is, in some cases, early and subject to revision (this would be equally
true if you sequenced the entire genome vs. genotyping, which is the SNP-based
technique used by 23andMe)."

[http://www.google.com/buzz/louisgray/ZMEciBEeakh/Review-23an...](http://www.google.com/buzz/louisgray/ZMEciBEeakh/Review-23andMe-
DNA-Testing-for-Health-Disease)

~~~
grandalf
Out of curiosity, why is the biobank necessary? Great review btw.

~~~
PStamatiou
It's not - it was an option during sign up. It's just useful in case they have
new features in the future and need to reanalyze your sample you won't need to
send in a saliva sample again.

~~~
grandalf
But don't they capture all of the information in your DNA? I'm just wondering
what other information could be extracted from the sample.

------
thorax
We got the family package and were pleased with the results. My wife was even
offered a free package to give to relatives because her genome was so unique
to them.

Note that you can download the raw data from 23andMe and go to the public
<http://www.snpedia.com> and use the app they have (Promethease) to get lots
of additional details that match your individual SNPs/genes.

Most of the SNPedia data (that 23andMe didn't have) was from newer studies
without massive amounts of confidence, but it was still fairly interesting.

~~~
thorax
I was surprised to see my above comment copied to the parent blog link as if
it was a comment on the blog itself. What's the software driving that? Very
disconcerting and pretty cool at the same time. Makes me hesitate to comment
on YC, though, when the comment could be taken out of context when read
elsewhere.

~~~
PStamatiou
I'm using a plugin by YC company BackType. it's called BackType connect. I
agree that there are some issues with context, especially when it doesnt
currently thread stuff. Which is why I opted for those comments to be pushed
to the bottom, after regular comments on my blog.

------
gommm
I'm really interested in 23andMe but I'm always a bit concerned about
privacy...

~~~
gommm
Actually thinking about it, it should be possible to purchase it with an
anonymous prepaid card and use a fake name? anyone knows good anonymous credit
cards that I could get in Asia or Europe?

------
lanstein
The family package is an excellent idea, Paul.

------
dschobel
Very cool. I wonder if they continuously update the correlative research and
its implications for existing customers. That seems like the portion which
needs the most work and I would hope you wouldn't have to pay $500 every few
years to see the latest results.

I would definitely subscribe to an annual service that would ping me every
time a new report came out with implications for me.

~~~
alito
The statistics and pieces of research get updated regularly, but not often.
More importantly, you can download your SNPs and go to SNPedia and look up
whatever you want by yourself.

------
celiadyer
Very interesting stuff. Probably the greatest value will be the wealth of data
gathered from the biobanking you agreed to. Glad you consented to that. DNA is
mind-boggling, and Watson & Crick made the most import discovery of the
Century elucidating its double-helix architecture in 1953, in my opinion.

------
pella
other “Relative Finder" - review:

"The odds of knowing your cousins: 23andme Part 1"

[http://ideas.4brad.com/odds-knowing-your-cousins-23andme-
par...](http://ideas.4brad.com/odds-knowing-your-cousins-23andme-part-1)

