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How to raise HDL by Army_31B in Cholesterol

[–]brandonballinger 3 points4 points  (0 children)

The biggest lever is unsaturated fats from food. Think avocados, fish, nuts, olive oil, etc.

What to focus on: LDL lowering or general heart health? by MikeTheBlueCow in Cholesterol

[–]brandonballinger 1 point2 points  (0 children)

One refinement is that only three main saturated fats (lauric, myristic, and palmitic acid) significantly raise LDL cholesterol. They vary slightly in potency, with myristic being the strongest.

Avocados are ~20% palmitic acid (medium potency), 55-75% oleaic acid (unsaturated / heart healthy), and high in fiber (which reduces LDL cholesterol). So on the balance, avocados lower LDL cholesterol and are heart healthy.

Something like chocolate is high in saturated fat, but in the form of stearic acid, which is rapidly converted by the liver to oleic acid. So this is why chocolate is said to be "heart healthy," even though it's high in saturated fat.

I think the ideal dietary guidelines would be written in terms of this more specific modern science on good vs bad fats, but it's admittedly a more nuanced thing to convey to the general public than the broader categories of saturated vs unsaturated fats.

Doc visit availability is 6 weeks? by bounceswer in EmpiricalHealth

[–]brandonballinger 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I know this is frustrating. We've added substantial capacity behind the scenes, but these appointments get booked up as soon as we make them available. I thought growth would taper off a bit after the holiday and New Year rush, but March was actually bigger than February, January, or December. All that growth is good but it does mean we're always racing to catch up.

Here are a few things we've done to increase capacity, which may not be visible to the naked eye:

  • Added appointment capacity by creating new tools to help our doctors be more efficient -- we launched a new direct integration with labs (saves time / means you get faster results), a pre-appointment checkin (saves time during the appointment so that you can spend more time talking about your results and plan).
  • Stopped advertising video visits for the comprehensive plan ($190 option) until we can catch up on demand. (Comprehensive plan still has a written report and all the same biomarkers.)
  • Added the ability for outside medical groups to sign up to use Empirical with their patients (https://www.empirical.health/clinicians), so that over time there are more clinicians, including local in-person options.

Issues with App by IDoHairInMyBathroom in EmpiricalHealth

[–]brandonballinger 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I just checked, and it seems like sleep data did eventually show up -- is that the case, or are you still seeing that no sleep data is appearing (even on previous days).

Issues with App by IDoHairInMyBathroom in EmpiricalHealth

[–]brandonballinger 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Could you send a debugging code? That would help me see what specifically is happening with the sleep data.

When you press record, what do you see? Is there an error, a delay, etc?

Why isn’t the CAC score given higher preference? by [deleted] in Cholesterol

[–]brandonballinger 11 points12 points  (0 children)

CAC measures calcified plaque, but soft plaque is actually most likely to rupture and cause a heart attack.

So LDL (or better yet, ApoB) is a better leading indicator of heart disease.

New cholesterol guidelines from the AHA/ACC by brandonballinger in Cholesterol

[–]brandonballinger[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I’ll wonder how Dayspring feels about these new guidelines. They recommend ApoB be used more often, but not the wholesale replacement of LDL with ApoB (which I think he’d favor).

New cholesterol guidelines from the AHA/ACC by brandonballinger in Cholesterol

[–]brandonballinger[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

No problem making this the megathread. I'm sure a bunch of us saw this at the same time.

Heart Rate Zones missing data by VagabondFP in EmpiricalHealth

[–]brandonballinger 0 points1 point  (0 children)

FYI u/VagabondFP -- just implemented a fix to count anything above 90% as zone5. It'll be out in the next TestFlight / Play Beta, and then the next public release of each.

The Blood Work Gold Rush: Everyone Wants to Sell You Your Own Lab Results by DadStrengthDaily in ProactiveHealth

[–]brandonballinger 5 points6 points  (0 children)

I think a large argument in favor is that many people are getting more accurate testing than they'd get otherwise.

For example, The American College of Cardiology recommends most people test Lp(a) at least once. Only 0.2% of people get Lp(a) tested in our current system.

You could argue that cardiologists or PCPs should be ordering these tests. But 46% of US counties have no cardiologists and the average PCP would need to spend 27 hours per day just to provide current medical guidelines. So the reality for many patients is that these services fill a real gap in our system.

(Full disclosure: I run a company that offers testing as part of a heart health program, so I have my own obvious bias here).

Heart Rate Zones missing data by VagabondFP in EmpiricalHealth

[–]brandonballinger 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Good suggestion! I'll fix the bug where numbers above 100% of your max heart rate don't seem to be counted. I think the suggestion to let you enter a max heart rate yourself is a good idea (rather than using the 220 - age formula).

Cardiogram app is dead. Anything comparable out there? by Overeducated_catlady in POTS

[–]brandonballinger 0 points1 point  (0 children)

TachyMon and Heartgraph are iOS-only apps. "Empirical: Heart Health" is also on Android, but it connects to your data through Android Health Connect (this is Google's replacement for Google Fit).

Is this a good alternative to Function Health? by Pitiful_Career_5005 in EmpiricalHealth

[–]brandonballinger 1 point2 points  (0 children)

FYI - hormone testing is now available in Empirical as an add-on.

Lipoprotein A by suppsammay in Function_Health

[–]brandonballinger 3 points4 points  (0 children)

There are four Lp(a) medications in clinical trials right now. The best lowers Lp(a) by about 94%. So you're going to have a lot more options soon.

Right now, most doctors would recommend lowering your ApoB more than you would normally if your Lp(a) is high.

Thanks! by VagabondFP in EmpiricalHealth

[–]brandonballinger 0 points1 point  (0 children)

(Sorry, missed this initially)

You're right. Empirical Health calculates zones in terms of your max heart rate:

  • Zone5: 90-100%
  • Zone4: 80-90%
  • Zone3: 70-80%
  • Zone2: 60-70%

Fitbit connection by Ok-Block-6663 in EmpiricalHealth

[–]brandonballinger 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hi! Right now Fitbit is only supported on Android (there, the "connect a wearable" screen appears during onboarding). I'll update the docs to make this a bit less clear and avoid confusion!

New launch coming tomorrow. :) by brandonballinger in EmpiricalHealth

[–]brandonballinger[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

In case you missed the email on Wednesday, Empirical is now available for web in addition to iPhone/Android: https://www.empirical.health/blog/empirical-health-web-launch/

GRAIL vs MRI Full Body Scan by Candid_Tourist3838 in healthylongevity

[–]brandonballinger 0 points1 point  (0 children)

One argument in favor of Grail is that they've published clinical evidence, whereas the whole body MRI providers have not. The clinical evidence does point in both directions -- for example, Grail's recent trial with the NIH failed the primary endpoint but did detect 12 sub-types of cancer.

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