More than one-third of U.S. adults regularly skip their annual medical checkup ­– a problem that has continued to grow in recent years.1

The reasons are many. Some individuals say they are unsure how effective the health care is, or that they have difficulty accessing care, or that the costs of care are unknown, while others dislike the typical medical examinations or find them uncomfortable.1 As a case in point, research shows that 20 percent of U.S. adults have “needle phobia” – a fear of needles or injections that are common in an annual medical checkup.2

Because of the above concerns, there is an increasing need for non-invasive biometrics that can be collected in non-traditional medical settings to assess the public’s health status and identify individuals with health risks. 

Thorne Lab (formerly Lab100) is designed to do just that – help the medical community predict, rather than react, with less invasive and more accessible screening approaches to collecting important clinical biometric data.

What is Thorne Lab? 

Thorne Lab is a modern health-risk assessment and biometric screening service. In just 60 minutes, a patient receives a full-body assessment, consultation, and digital report card conducted by a licensed health-care provider.

In each visit, Thorne Lab analyzes eight health and wellness assessments with more than 50 metrics from research-validated quantitative survey data, vital signs, clinical labs, body composition and anthropometrics, dexterity, strength, balance, and cognition.

The comprehensive evaluation is performed in a condensed, comfortable, modern experience space. Patients receive their immediate results on-site with comparisons to large-scale adult populations, along with a plan to upgrade their health metrics and track health outcomes. 

Designed to be the clinic of the future, Thorne Lab is the site of research recently published in Frontiers in Cardiovascular Medicine by scientists from Thorne and the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City. Using Thorne Lab’s unique and less-invasive evaluations to address recent trends in patient health-care dissatisfaction, the researchers investigated possible associations between body composition, anthropometrics, and lipid panels in a normative population to easily identify those with dyslipidemia.3

The study

The study included 199 patients not on a medication for dyslipidemia. They visited the Thorne Lab at Mount Sinai for the full clinic experience. Only the body composition, anthropometric, and blood data were used for this study.

All patients arrived fasted for a venipuncture blood draw. Blood was analyzed on a point-of-care Abbott Piccolo Xpress analyzer, which is portable, reliable, and provides results in about 30 minutes. Patients also underwent body composition measures using the InBody750, which has been validated against the gold-standard DEXA and provides percent body fat (%BF), visceral fat level (VFL), skeletal muscle mass (SMM) water, and bone mass. Anthropometric data was analyzed using the Fit3D ProScanner, which is validated against the gold-standard Air Displacement Plethysmography (ADP). Linear regression measured the associations of anthropometric variables on lipid biomarkers along with regression analysis.

The results

The average age of participants was 40, with an equal split between females and males. They all had normal cholesterol levels with averages of: 185 mg/dL total cholesterol, 64 mg/dL HDL cholesterol, 99 mg/dL LDL cholesterol, 22 mg/dL VLDL cholesterol, and 111 mg/dL triglycerides. 

The initial analysis showed the waist-to-hip ratio to be correlated with every laboratory value measured. The Association of Body Shape Index (ABSI; a metric that describes fat distribution and abdominal fat proportion), however, was not correlated with any. VFL, %BF, SMM, and Surface-Based Body Shape Index (SBSI) were all associated with some metrics. The most significant correlation was seen between SMM and HDL cholesterol – for every 1-unit increase in SMM, researchers found a 0.81-unit decrease in the average HDL level.  

After adjusting for age, sex, race, alcohol use, and current smoking status, VFL and %BF were found to be associated with every laboratory value. The waist-to-hip ratio had some significant associations, the most being HDL cholesterol, VLDL cholesterol, and triglycerides (p < 0.0001). SMM, SBSI, and ABSI had no correlations, while %BF showed the two most significant associations with VLDL cholesterol (t = 4.53, p = 0.0001) and TG (t = 4.51, p = 0.0001).

Conclusions

The takeaways from this small but impactful publication are three-fold:

1. Body composition metrics, while not often collected in traditional medical settings, can serve as a profound predictor of common health concerns like hypertension, cardiovascular disease, and diabetes. In this study, three specific body composition metrics (VLF, %BF, and waist-to-hip ratio) were shown to be relatively strong predictors of lipid values.

2. Anthropometric values like waist circumference or BMI, which are commonly used as screening tools for disease progression and weight management, were not insightful for metabolic health risk. This study did not see any meaningful correlations between lipid values and ABSI, which is calculated using both BMI and waist circumference.

3. Given the recent trends in preventative health care showing a change in patient preference toward clinical assessments in non-traditional settings, the next-generation Thorne Lab is a solution that provides a comfortable experience, non-invasive biometric data collection, and high-accuracy data assessments that can predict an individual’s risk for the biggest metabolic health concerns and pave the way to implement timely dietary and lifestyle changes that can enhance and extend quality of life. 

Learn more

This promising research is pioneering the future potential of what will be necessary in order to analyze in a Thorne Lab visit; how to collect it in the easiest, most convenient, and least invasive but still research-backed method; and what it means for health risks today and as we continue to age. 

A Thorne Lab can be operated by a single health-care professional in either clinical or academic medical centers – for patients of all ages. If you are interested in Thorne Lab and its capabilities, then we encourage you to reach out to our team.  

References

  1. Taber JM, Leyva B, Persoskie A. Why do people avoid medical care? A qualitative study using national data. J Gen Intern Med 2015;30(3):290-297.
  2. Love AS, Love RJ. Considering needle phobia among adult patients during mass COVID-19 vaccinations. J Prim Care Community Health 2021;12:21501327211007393.
  3. Weeks M, Delgado AD, Wood J, et al. Relationships between body composition, anthropometrics, and standard lipid panels in a normative population. Front Cardiovasc Med 2023;10. doi:10.3389/fcvm.2023.1280179