Everlywell Review: Which Tests to Order and Which to Skip
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One of the things I admire about Everlywell is the company’s female founder, Julia Cheek. As a father to a 3 year old daughter, stories like Julia’s are even more inspiring to me than before I became a parent. That, and like me, Julia is a Shark Tank alum, which is also cool.
Everlywell is committed to privacy, offering users a guarantee that their results will remain confidential. Further, Everlywell’s privacy policy explains that they do not sell your personal data to third parties for marketing or commercial purposes. Based on the journey of the founder, the sheer amount of capital they have raised, and the acquisitions in the health space they have made, I trust the company as a reputable provider.
However, that doesn’t mean I would recommend all of their tests, especially the ones that deal with nutrition.
Everlywell offers a wide array of at-home tests, many of which are allopathic and “right down the line” with mainstream medicine, and others that are based on junk science, like their IgG food sensitivity tests.
In this review, I want to do something simple, divide the Everylwell library into categories based on their level of scientific support. I ordered one of the most important Everlywell tests, the FIT colon cancer screening test, and will share my experience with that process, but first let’s address the food sensitivity test.
Get Started With Personalized Nutrition
Gene Food uses a proprietary algorithm to divide people into one of twenty diet types based on genetics. We score for cholesterol and sterol hyperabsorption, MTHFR status, histamine clearance, carbohydrate tolerance, and more. Where do you fit?
Why I don’t recommend Everlywell food sensitivity tests
I have written in the past about the dubious science underlying IgG based food sensitivity tests, and was fortunate to interview Dr. Joel Evans, MD on the subject in a past episode of the Gene Food Podcast. I’ve embedded a crucial section of that interview below.
What I see a lot of in today’s nutrition discussions are people who are afraid of their food. They fear wheat, dairy, lectins, histamine, and many other components of food. More of us suffer from chronic illness and digestive issues than ever before, and yet we still need nourishment to be healthy.
My big concern with IgG based food sensitivity tests like the ones Everlywell sells is the potential for sending customers down a rabbit hole where they are led to believe their food sensitivities are far more extensive than they actually are. You could make the case that these IgG based food sensitivity tests are so outdated that they should be taken off the market.
Everlywell’s important mission – early detection
While the at-home food sensitivity tests offer very little value, and could actually lead customers in the wrong direction with their food choices, some of the company’s tests are a great service to the public.
For example, the FIT colon cancer screening test.
While this test isn’t a substitute for a colonoscopy, by looking for blood in the stool, FIT testing offers an important early detection option for those too young to have insurance cover a colonscopy, or who are simply too scared to go in for the procedure.
In my case, at age 44, I was right on the fence of the cut-off line for insurance coverage of a colonoscopy. I waited to send in my FIT test for several months because I feared a false positive, which is all too common. So, I sent in my test kit closer to my scheduled appointment so I wouldn’t have the stress of a false positive hanging over my head if for some reason my results weren’t accurate.
Despite propensity for false positives, preventing colon cancer is all about early detection, and a FIT test is better than nothing at all. Offering FIT testing to consumers is invaluable and surely saves lives.
Similarly, the battery of STD testing offered by Everlywell is also important.
Sexually transmitted diseases often go undetected because people don’t want to visit a clinic to discuss such private matters. For example, a study by Cunningham et al. (2009) found that adolescents who perceived higher levels of STD‐related stigma were significantly less likely to have been tested for STDs in the past year. This suggests that the anticipation of negative judgment can discourage individuals from seeking out testing, even when it’s needed for early detection and treatment. By offering direct to consumer testing, Everlywell allows those who think they may have contracted an STD to get results in the privacy of their own home.
Cholesterol & lipids test
I’ve been lucky to have had the chance to interview and befriend lipid expert, Dr. Tom Dayspring, over the last several years. According to him, and many others in the lipid world like Alan Sniderman, the gold standard for a lipid assay is ApoB, not LDL-C.
Everlywell measures only very basic metrics like LDL-C, HDL, triglycerides and total cholesterol, in other words, mass based diagnostics.
These tests still add value as they usually match up with ApoB, but not always, so many consumers will instead want to work with a lab like Boston Heart Diagnostics that offers LDL sub-fraction and particle count tests.
Or to stay in the at-home test kit works, new entrant, Function Health offers much more advanced lipid testing than does Everlywell with ApoB as one of the metrics offered in their yearly plan.
Kit registration and user experience
As a founder of a startup that sells at-home test kits, I have become a bit of a nerd when it comes to checkout flows and user experience. Everlywell, like Viome, employs a system that prompts users to create an account as part of the kit registration process, not at the time of purchase. This allows for an easy, Shopify like experience shopping for and buying test kits.
I am jealous of the 4-step progress bar Everlywell uses to map the progress of testing from registration through results (and may work with my team to build something similar into the Gene Food dashboard). The feature allows for max transparency letting users know exactly when their results will be ready.
Overall, the level of refinement with the user experience is impressive and should make the purchase and testing process easy for most Everlywell customers, including those that aren’t particularly tech savvy.
Final thoughts
I have a great deal of respect for the Everlywell mission. Testing companies like these democratize health care and allow consumers access to testing that can help them live healthier lives. That’s not hyperbole, it’s a fact. The only place I draw issue with Everlywell is with their food sensitivity test which I believe has the potential to force confused customers into overly restrictive diets that aren’t necessary or based in sound science.
