What are the best blood test to take for improving health?
What are the better online blood testing companies?
What blood tests can I ask my primary to take?
As best I can tell they all contract out to Labcorp or Quest for the actual labwork, so I figure the quality of the testing should be equivalent. I’ve been happy with Walk-in Lab, Life Extension, DirectLabs, and DiscountedLabs.
I’ve gotten a lot of value out of self-testing bloodwork, so I made a hobby site listing the different online sources for a given test.
I have a tight budget and am biased towards improving thyroid function, so I find cheap tests like TSH, chemistry + CBC, a lipid panel, prolactin (as a proxy for serotonin, estrogen, and thyroid), and hs-CRP (for inflammation) useful. I think doctors are pretty friendly towards ordering the first 3.
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danwich’s answer is pretty cool. You can browse through the mentioned store and look for something like “basic wellness/health panel”. These panels usually contain the most common cheap lab tests to evaluate your overall wellness.
Sites that were mentioned are direct-to-consumer, so you don’t need to ask your PCP for a lab order.
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Time to update this thread with news about Own Your Labs, which has the best service (and prices) for anyone doing self-testing. I’ve used them several times now and couldn’t be happier. How can you beat $23.61 total for a full lipid (cholesterol) panel and comprehensive metabolic.
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Hi I am on medicare and would like to know if I self order labs and pay out of pocket does medicare reimburse me?