Is the Ubiome SmartGut Test Worth It?

It seems that wherever I look, I’m hearing more about the microbiome and how our gut bacteria affects everything from sleep to mood to weight. So when one of my friends told me that genetics company Ubiome was making their SmartGut test kit available for free for a limited amount of time, I decided to try it out.

Did it end up telling me anything useful though? Ehh…I’m not convinced yet.

Note: I am not affiliated in any way with Ubiome. I only received it for free through a general promotion available to the public at the time.

What is the Ubiome SmartGut Test?

Ubiome is a microbial genomics company. In other words, they sequence the genetic information from the organisms in various body environments. Their SmartGut test kit sequences the genome of the bacteria living in your gut.

On a more practical level, it’s a test kit that tests a swab of your poo (lovely, right), and in return gives you a report with information on the diversity and quantity of your bacteria.

How does it work?

I got the kit for “free”—and I kind of did, or at least that’s what Ubiome wanted me to think.

At the time, Ubiome was advertising that it would pay any out-of-pocket expenses associated with the SmartGut kit. I’m not sure how much it costs now, but if I had ended up needing to pay what my insurance didn’t cover, I would have owed a whopping

The Ubiome SmartGut test kit looks like this:

And inside you get some swabs, solution for the samples, and shipping materials.

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I will say that Ubiome made the collection process, shipping, and all of that very easy to do. You just swab some toilet paper after going, swish the swab around in a vial of solution, seal it and put it in the mail.

One slightly annoying part of the process is that you have to remember to go online and register your kit using the number on the test kit, or else you can’t get your results.

Unfortunately, after sending off my sample, my satisfaction with the Ubiome SmartGut kit rapidly diminished. I waited for results…and waited…and waited. I finally had to email them, multiple times, and was promised my results would be available “soon.”

Overall, it took almost two months for me to receive my results! Had I actually been trying to use this test in my medical treatment, for example to see if I had a harmful pathogen, that’s a LONG time to wait.

But, was the wait worth it? Read on…

What is sequencing my gut microbiome supposed to tell me?

Ubiome claims that its SmartGut test kit “detects beneficial and pathogenic microorganisms associated with gut conditions like irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), and inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), including ulcerative colitis and Crohn’s Disease.” It claims that “you and your doctor can gain valuable insights to better understand what’s going on inside your gut, then take steps for you to feel better.”

Personally, I was interested in whether or not this test could actually tell me anything useful that I could translate into clinical action. For example, was I deficient in anything that I could remedy by taking a supplement? Was there harmful bacteria that I could address by an antibiotic?

What do the test results actually look like?

When you get the SmartGut test results back, it’s a multi-page report that generally looks like this:

The report gives you an overview of whether the diversity in your microbiome is normal, when compared to a “healthy reference range.” Ubiome developed that range using 897 samples from self-reported healthy individuals, so take with a grain of sand–what one person considers “normal” may not be another person’s “normal.”

It also tests for certain pathogens, which could be helpful. However, there are conventional stool sample tests that test for those same pathogens at a fraction of the cost.

Finally, the test assesses a number of bacteria and measures the amount of that organism present. It also tells you whether those organisms are associated with diarrhea, IBS, inflammatory bowel disease, Crohn’s, ulcerative colitis, constipation, abdominal tenderness, bloating, flatulence, obesity, diabetes, kidney stones.

My Ubiome SmartGut test results weren’t that helpful.

Strangely, my own test results only showed one abnormal level of bacteria out of the eight bacteria that Ubiome has identified as associated with diarrhea. The test noted that my population of Lactobacillus is low.

Now, Lactobacillus is one bacteria that you can readily get from yogurt, fermented foods, and probiotics. But, there are many different kinds of Lactobacillus. And it’s not clear to me if they are all equally as beneficial or if certain kinds are shown to help more with diarrhea. Ubiome doesn’t offer any sort of assistance with interpreting this fact, or any sort of clinical action to take.

That sort of issue is repeated throughout the test. It showed certain populations of bacteria that were low but for many of these organisms, there’s no clear way to remedy the issue. Unlike Lactobacillus, many (most!) bacteria aren’t available in a supplement. The best you can do is eat fermented foods and hope for the best.

Ultimately, I wouldn’t recommend the Ubiome SmartGut test.

Ultimately, I can’t recommend the Ubiome SmartGut test. First of all, it took FOREVER to just get the test results.

Second, the test is very, very expensive. Ubiome billed my insurance carrier approximately $2,000 for the test, of which my insurance covered about half. If I hadn’t ordered the test during Ubiome’s promotional period where they covered all out of pocket expenses, I would have been seriously screwed.

It’s important to note that unlike conventional stool sample tests, insurers treat this test as a genetic test. Genetic tests are often not covered or only partially covered. So watch out if you do order.

Finally, and most importantly, I don’t feel like I got a lot of clinically useful information from this test. I could take Lactobacillus and see if it helps, but I’ve taken lots of probiotics before and had inconclusive results. And for most of the bacteria the test identified as out of balance for me, there is no clear way to supplement with. So ultimately, knowledge is not power in this case.

I’m hopeful that maybe in five years tests like this will yield clinically useful information that can actually improve symptoms. But right now, I don’t think that’s the case and so I don’t think the potential cost of this test justifies the knowledge gained.