Viome

Need precision supplements desperately but prohibited from access.

Extremely frustrating to get around. The app forces you to make so so many clicks to get where want and good luck remembering how if you need to go back there.

I was so excited when I heard about this on the Bulletproof Podcast. Finally a microbiome test! I ordered it immediately, but the experience fell short. Everything just lacks precision. The manual for example give instructions 1/2/4 (no 3rd step), and overall the whole experience is so inconsistent that it makes me doubt about the accuracy of the results. Any company that does laboratory work has to build its credibility on accuracy. Additionally, in today’s modern world, NOBODY is willing to wait 6 weeks plus for any test result. There is no test that takes this time and samples also expire and are no longer viable for testing. With all of this, I will not be using or recommending this company. It is a true shame as the world really needs this right now, but it needs a company that is built with more consistency, care and accuracy with the wellness of the end user at its core. Genova diagnostics is a better option just now, though it may require a practitioner to order the test for you.

Crashed 20 times while using it. For an expensive product they’ve really cheaped out on the app - I’m guessing someone got their child to build it to save some $. Questionnaires take an hour to fill in rather than 15 mins as it crashes and you have to start again. Truly a shocking introduction to a company and really shakes your faith that anything they do will be of any value.

Use the web version in a browser. Probably the usual story: clever software engineer in one discipline 'having a go at' app development in their spare time ...

Its best not to walk around blind or ignorant. I got a test and it told me the things I thought I was intolerant to but still eating every day. Since then I have followed the advice of the app and held off with those foods, and am taking the supplements they recommended. It gives advice and details on superfoods and avoids but I wish it would elaborate more on the MINIMIZE foods.

so buggy and bad that makes me question the quality of the rest of their services. if you can’t make a simple app what is left for anything else

Live in the UK and saw this in an article and decided to give it a try due to my IBS and gut issues. 2 tests and 4 months later, nada. The app bugs out, doesn’t save the answers to the questionnaires. The interface is crap - back buttons forgotten in places. Seriously, who designed this? I would ask for a refund if I thought it was worth the time and effort it would take! Stop spending time on looking good and doing the back end stuff!

The testing service and resulting insight fall short of expectations. Yes they give insight as to what’s going on in your gut & follow up with resulting diet advice but it’s not to a level as one would expect, for example: one would think having an allergy or intolerance to gluten would see diet advice free of gluten containing foods but that not the case, the opposite is often true, sadly. Other users with issues with the likes of histamines, nightshades etc have also questioned their recommended food intake consisting of foods that clearly result in issues for themselves. The service as a whole sells the suggestion that you can make “illness optional” by following their dietary advice but although dietary behaviour no doubt impacts the microbiome and the microbiome no doubt plays a huge part in our health and wellness Viome’s suggestions for optimal health leave one feeling sceptical, for example: they highlight a number of foods on a ‘minimise’ list and advise that such foods should form a minimal part of one’s diet, at the same time they highlight foods that should you should ‘enjoy’ they then go on to suggest that optimal health is obtained by simply eating more of ‘enjoy’ foods whilst eating a lesser portion size of the ‘minimise’ foods. Such small differences in portion size make it hard to believe that such an approach is the key to optimal gut health and optimal overall wellness to such a degree “illness can be optional” - to quote Viome’s slogan. As for their customer care, it’s almost non existent, it’s common to email support and be left without a reply for one week, often longer, which isn’t acceptable from any company and certainly not a supposed ‘game changer’ out of Silicon Valley who sell a premium priced serviced. Their operation & their transparency could also fairly be questioned, they shut their service down recently and their communication & handling of the whole matter inc ‘explanations’ coming from them were not clear & questionable. Their ceo went as far as to state on Facebook that they hadn’t paused operations at all when not only was it clearly evident in the community they had done so but their next mass communication to their client base confirmed exactly what the CEO was obviously aware of but choose, for what ever reason, to deny publicly. The ceo is Naveen Jain, prospective clients may wish to check him out on YouTube or similar before deciding whether he installs enough faith to make use of his company’s service.

Update is more diet focused now, was gut focused before, will probably cancel subscription it’s that bad!!