There are  a ton of "functional" labs out there today. In this podcast, I cover the most important labs for managing autoimmunity. If there is one takeaway from this episode, it is: FOCUS ON THE BASICS FIRST! So often someone brings me in a fancy methylation panel, hormone panel, or stool sample and they don't know their basics.  I divide these labs into 3 categories:

1. Basics - Basic blood markers are the foundation, and often people have them from multiple practitioners and you can compare apples to apples. These include CBC and CMP (which I discuss how important these are!), iron/TIBC, ferritin, homocysteine, vitamin D, thyroid markers, LDH, HbA1C, inflammatory markers like CRP, TGFbeta, GlycA, TNFa, and more.

2. Autoimmune-Specific Tests - antibodies including ANA, thyroid, rheumatoid factor, gut tissue, neurological tissue; barrier integrity such as gut barrier and blood-brain-barrier; advanced immune tests such as T & B Lymphocytes.  In this section I give a special focus to Cyrex labs, who is in my opinion the leader in autoimmune reactivity testing.

3. Drivers - Foods, Toxins, Stress, Hormones, and Hidden Infections. This includes food sensitivities, stool testing, toxin testing, and more. I discuss some of my favorites, which include Cyrex again, Great Plains, GI Map, Dried Urine Hormones from Meridian Valley, and more.