Athletigen and Vitagene

[MikeOwl]

Has anyone here tested with either of these two companies?

Athletigen is no more (they are transitioning to a different format according to the company) but they were around for a bunch of years and I uploaded my 23andMe raw data back when they were in business.

Vitagene is still around for now and I've both uploaded my 23andMe raw data and taken the test they offer.

I'm posting this in the "Medical and Psychological Genetics" section but it would probably be better off in a "Health and Fitness" section of the DNA forums.

 

[Doggerland]

I have tested Vitagene. I would not recommend it. There are two reasons for it: The first one is that the company is not answering if they really test the samples for the SNPs or if they are using Imputation, an inaccurate procedure for the testing of single health related SNPs.

The second reason is that the assumptions made by Vitagene should not taken serious. For example they tell you that you are genetically prone to a certain type of malnutrition of nutrients and vitamines, which in my case is not true. This is part of the companys strategy to sell supplements. In my case i am listed as a candidate for celiac disease and should not consume grains. But this isnt true, not even from a genetic perspective. I carry SNPs that make a celiac disease worse, but i dont carry the main alleles for celiac disease and not I or even someone in my family has celiac disease.

The really relevant SNPs that can be interesting for planing your diet like if you are of a higher cancer risk when consuming red meat, how many copies of amylase you have, this things will not be tested. They test for things that lead you to a strange modern diet, like low carb, even if you have a neolithic set of alleles for carb metabolism.

 

[MikeOwl]

Vitagene is a partner company with FTDNA. That's a main reason why I took them seriously.

Are you saying that the raw data that Vitagene gives for SNPs is inaccurate? Interpretation is one thing but if the raw analysis is wrong then it's worthless.

Also, yes, I noticed that they are trying to sell vitamins and other supplements and that disappointed me.

Finally, the "low carb" thing: they categorized me as a "slow carbohydrate metabolizer" and said that I should choose whole grains over refined carbohydrates. Whole grains are definitely a great thing but are refined carbs a bad thing? Isn't it all dependent on how much energy you need and use? Couch potatoes and office workers don't need much but active people need lots of carbohydrates.

 

[Doggerland]

I don’t know. I contacted the company and asked if they are using Imputation and they don’t answered.

They categorized me as slow carb metabolizer too. I am not a slow carb metabolizer, I eat a lot of carbs without getting obese. Bread in the morning, noodles or home made pizza in the noon, bread again in the evening. I don’t eat sweets or snacks like crisps, but drink alot of alcohol free beer. My BMI is 22.2. I walk 6-10 kilometers daily and every second day I do hard work for 2-3 hours like digging, carrying logs or pulling a pushcart of animal muck, cleaning stables.

Vitagene also says I am not prone to stress/emotional eating. I once worked in an office that was over 10 years ago and it was a very stressful time. I ate chocolate bars every day on my workplace and got obese. Idon’t think that this assumption by Vitagene was right.

I am listed as fast caffeine metabolizer but I don’t drink coffee, energy drinks or cola at all. If I drink them I feel like psychotic and it lasts the whole day, I cannot sleep. As I was younger I drank cola and if I did this in the afternoon, I stayed wake till 4 am.
My wife is listed as slow caffeine metabolizer and she drinks over 6 cups daily and has a low heart rate of 60bpm.

But the inaccuracy of Vitagene can also be based on the "wrong" SNPs they test or not enough ones.

 

[Yinwang888]

You can't "say" anything about these traits from looking at one SNP at the time. It's ludicrously wrong.
These types of fitness related traits or stress are all polygenic and you need to use polygenic risk scores. So you are absolutely correct when you wrote that they don't look at enough SNPs. Neither Vitagene or Atletigen ever did.

Regarding imputation, it's not entirely true that it's erroneous. The thing is, that given that you *have* to look at hundreds of SNPs for any if these scores to be correct, then the cost in precision of lacking some SNPs in your measurements is much bigger than the cost in precision introduced by imputation.

You should check out impute-me with your data. It's free and it's much more accurate than those two other companies.

 

[Angela]

A lot of people here don't accept that most traits are polygenic. You'll get used to it.

 

[Yinwang888]

I guess so

 

[MikeOwl]

I did a quick scan of my Vitagene reports and the salt sensitivity report contains 11 SNPs while the lactose intolerance report is only one SNP. The carbohydrate metabolism report lists two SNPs.

I looked at ImputeMe and I'll definitely give it a try. It reminded me of Promethease (although I haven't actually gone through my Promethease results in a few years).

 

[Yinwang888]

Wish you good luck

 

[Henry19]

thank you information!!!

 

[MikeOwl]

It seems like Athletigen's nutrition and athletic performance reports have been available again on Sequencing for a while.

A week or two ago I received a mass email from the founder of GeneFood, John O'Connor, saying that they were coming back after an absence.

I hadn't noticed they were gone but I had uploaded my 23andMe raw data to them not long after I had posted on here about Athletigen and Vitagene. They are pricier than those two companies- even the upload of 23andMe data was fairly expensive compared to other companies' upload prices.

For those not familiar with it, GeneFood places people into one of 20 different diet types: mine is called "Trainer" and seems to be more accurate in regard to what I know from personal experience about what kind of food I should be eating for optimal health.

It's pricier- even for an upload- and I'm not sure I like the redesigned website but I'd like to hear from anyone with their thoughts on GeneFood if they are familiar with it.