I’m thinking of giving my family 23andMe kits for Christmas. Has anybody here used this company? Were you happy with the results? Is there anybody here who has a strong enough background in molecular genetics to offer an expert opinion on their service? The company was suggested to me by my biology instructor, but he said he really didn’t know anything about them, such as are they the best, what do they test for, do they have a solid reputation, etc.
If you do not have enough of a solid background in genetics to understand the results without freaking out then do not do it!
At best they can show you some cool stuff about your genetic makeup.
At worst they can uncover a predisposition to something that changes your risk of some condition from X% to X+N%. Depending on the exact numbers and how it is phrased it could be something that unnecessarily worries you.
Suppose a random person off the street has a 0.1% (100 in 100,000) chance of having a condition. Your test result show you have a gene variant that raises your risk to 0.15% (150 in 100,000) of having that condition.
If you are the type of person who worries that you have a 50% increased chance of having the condition, then don’t get tested! If you can wrap your head around the idea that your risk went from 99.9% chance that you will not have the condition to 99.85% you will not have the condition then you might can deal with it.
Have a backup plan in place for referral to a genetic counselor just in case.
Oh God—no worries there. Have you ever read How to Lie With Statistics? My father used to talk about this book with me when I was barely out of preschool.
I am happy with them - and they have a good reputation. I don’t think you need a solid background in genetics per se, but like Iggy says - you should be able to understand that a 50% increase in getting a disease doesn’t really mean much when you are talking something less than 1% to begin with.
I like it, but I am a geek. It is somewhat neat from an ancestry perspective, but there wasn’t anything on there that really surprised me.
Overall - id say if you don’t think someone will like it - they probably won’t. I’d wager to say most people that would like it - either know about it - or would be the type of people that would say - “ooh - that’s cool” as soon as it was mentioned. Not sure if that is helpful.
It is a lot cheaper than it used to be.
You can sign up for a demo account - it will let you see what types of thngs are avail -here are a few of the items under “diseases risk” for me (out of I guess 100 or so) (sorry it doesn’t cut and paste well):
Name Confidence Your Risk Avg. Risk Compared to Average
Melanoma
2.2% 2.9% 0.75x
Exfoliation Glaucoma
0.6% 0.7% 0.79x
Rheumatoid Arthritis
0.5% 2.4% 0.23x
Esophageal Squamous Cell Carcinoma (ESCC)
0.3% 0.4% 0.80x
Crohn’s Disease
0.2% 0.5% 0.38x
Stomach Cancer (Gastric Cardia Adenocarcinoma)
0.2% 0.2% 0.77x
Type 1 Diabetes
0.06% 1.02% 0.06x
Celiac Disease
0.06% 0.12% 0.48x
Well, the person I want to give it to has a medical background, is a Super-Duper-Über-Geek (when I want to get her goat, I tell her that she’s the type of girl who would have been the treasurer of the Star Trek Club in high school), and is a genealogy nut.
The one thing I find off-putting about their company is that they don’t have a toll-free customer service line. I do have a few prefatory questions I’d like answered before I plunk down $300, but they only do e-mail or web chat. That strikes me as being a little cheesy.
One of the main questions I have is what do I get for the $300? Do I get the full report of 244 disease markers and access to the genealogy database? The web site doesn’t make that clear. When you go to the home page there’s a big pink button next to the picture of the kit that says “add to cart.” But if you click ‘Ancestry,’ it says “One Price. Enjoy a subscription-free, ongoing service,” and next to that is another big pink ‘add to cart’ button. So does that mean each one costs $300? Or is it $300 for the whole schmiel?
The woman who started it is married to Sergey Brin (one of the guys who started Google). I mention this - as Google isn’t known for providing phone support either 
also I mention this as it isn’t like they are going to rip you off.
I think it is 300 for the whole thing.
They used to have a subscription service, but that was eliminated months ago. I suspect left over web design is what is causing the confusion.
Sign up for a demo account. I think it shows what you get access to (they basically give you access - if memory serves - to someones account (that has agreed to this)). I think you see everything I would see when I sign on. They used to have different plans for genealogy and the like, but now I think it is all one price.
I know not have phone support is annoying, but sometimes with these web companies you have little choice.
Sound like she might like it BTW.
I typed this while you were responding to my previous post:
Also, here’s complete list of the potential disease-related markers that they test for: 23andMe DNA Testing Kit for Health + Ancestry - 23andMe.
We’re particularly interested in carrier status for several of those. When you get the report back, do they just tell you whether you’re a carrier or not, or do they tell you your full genotype for those alleles, i.e., homozygous dominant, heterozygous, homozygous recessive?
But now that I know that the free trial shows what a real result looks like, I can get that info myself. Thanks for your input—this helps a lot.
Yes - In case the demo doesn’t show you - you get the SNP details AA AG GG (or whatever ever if is for that SNP) - sometimes there is more than one for that status. You can also download all your SNPs as well (that they have off the chip). I am on the old chip - I’m an early adopter 
- so about half my results don’t have data for it. Haven’t gotten around to upgrading.
There is also a star rating for earth trait/status and the like. It is designed to reflect how good the research is (not sure how the determine this - I may have known) on that SNP. I assume the more people in the study, p values, blah blah…
It is pretty easy to use - and geek friendly.
I did find someone who I think (and they estimate) is like a 4th - 5th cousin to me. I forgot to mention that before. All of that stuff is optional for privacy reasons.
I’m a customer, both for the health data and genealogy data. I’d do it again in a heartbeat.
It’s $299 for everything.
They cap the relative finder at 1,000 people. If you hit 1,000, the smallest percentage shared relatives drop off.
I don’t know anything about this particular company, but it seems to me you could save a lot of money just testing your mom and dad, rather than your whole family…
There’s only enough money for one this year, so I’m starting with my wife. I’m not even going to do myself yet.
Beside, your statement is only partially valid. While testing your parents would provide some interesting information, it doesn’t convey enough information. Let’s say your father died of Huntington’s disease. Well, you don’t even have to test him, you know he was heterozygous dominant for the allele. A quick trip to the cemetery would verify that. But your mom is a Japanese woman in her early sixties who is the picture of health. You’re more likely to win the state Lotto than to have her be anything but homozygous recessive for HD. You, however, still have a 50% chance of being up Doo-Doo Creek without a paddle. So even if you had a dozen brothers and sisters, you would all have (or at least want) to be tested individually.
Well, sure, it depends on what you’re looking for and what you find. I spent about six years working in a human genetics lab. If it were me, not knowing what, if anything, I’d find, I’d do the parents first, and if anything worrying came up, you could test the kids for specific mutations individually as needed. Doing specific tests is far cheaper than doing the whole genome.
Oh, you’re right— if you have a group of a zillion siblings, you could cut to the chase quicker by testing just the parents.
So what’s the cheapest rate for whole-genome sequencing these days? How long before it gets down to the $1000 range?
I thought I heard sub-$5000 prices quoted lately, but I forget where. I think people are expecting the $1000 mark within, oh, five years or so.
Want! Bad!
I actually just purchased this on Cyber Monday for both me and my wife for $49 each including shipping.
23andme unfortunately used that day to run some price experiments, where they offered people different prices (e.g. $299, $199, $69, $49). They used web browser cookies so that if you had previously been to the site, you would see the $299 offer. What they didn’t count on was that people would talk about the test prices on Facebook. It has gotten many of their potential customers very angry: 23andMe
Our kits just shipped, and I’m looking forward to getting them.
I have 23andMe and have been happy with it. I haven’t done much with it other than explore my own genetic data, but the message boards are interesting, as is the relative finder.
I actually got my kit for free as part of a larger sarcoma study, since last year I had to have two phyllodes tumors removed from my boobs (a form of sarcoma in its more malignant aspects, although benign in my case, fortunately). I was happy to contribute, and the other information provided was very useful (such as my being negative for the three most common genetic markers for regular breast cancer-- it’s not the same as the high-powered version of the test, but still good to know!)
Price dropped from $299 to $99. Just in time for the holidays!
Note: I suspect they are overwhelmed with orders and the chances of getting a kit in time for Christmas is small. Be prepared to make a “I got you a DNA testing kit.” note to stick in a card.
We’ll see. I placed the order about three hours ago.