Individualized MicroNutrient Testing for patients

In response to the current trend toward personalized medicine, the Beaumont Weight Control Center, affiliated with Beaumont Hospitals, a major Detroit-area health system, now offers individualized MicroNutrient Testing for patients. This addition to their weight loss program helps patients identify their specific nutritional deficiencies in 30 different vitamins, minerals and antioxidants, using a patented technology from SpectraCell Laboratories.

The Beaumont Weight Control Center offers a variety of medical and surgical weight loss options. The Center has helped thousands of patients over the past 20 years lose weight and keep it off. Studies have proven that being just 20 percent overweight can increase your risk for heart disease, diabetes, stroke and even some cancers. There is also overwhelming evidence that nutritional deficiencies, if not corrected, can cause any number of diseases, such as arthritis, allergies, cancer, diabetes, obesity, depression, fatigue, heart disease, and dozens of other conditions, many whose etiology is often difficult to pinpoint.

"Nearly half of people taking vitamin supplements have nutrient deficiencies that vary from person to person, because we are all biochemically unique," explains Katherine Nori Janosz, M.D., F.A.C.P., internal and bariatric medicine specialist at the Beaumont Weight Control Center. "Nutritional status is an essential building block of good health."

SpectraCell's MicroNutrient Test reports this valuable personalized information. A person's white blood cells are introduced to various nutrient environments and their growth response is measured. Changes in growth determine if that person has what is called a functional deficiency in any of the tested nutrients.

Most people know that gross nutrient deficiencies can cause specific diseases, such as vitamin C and scurvy or vitamin D and rickets. However, when the deficiencies are more subtle, they will typically be undetected by conventional diagnostic methods, although such sub-clinical deficiencies will indeed contribute to disease. The metabolic pathways in each person are so complex that a single nutrient deficiency can affect several of the body's systems. That is why an understanding of a person's long-term nutritional status is critical to achieve optimal health.