Throughout your life, you have probably been told to eat your fruit and vegetables. Many of us likely never questioned this advice—beyond maybe making a few faces when we were younger—but ate our greens because we were told to do so. Little did we know that choosing to follow that advice did have an impact on the direction our body’s health would take.
We already track the changes in our health over time. We follow our health trajectory and attempt to predict the course it may take in the future. The changes in our health can be rapid—such as a bout with the flu that comes and goes quickly—or gradual. When we are able to look back at our health trajectory over time, it empowers us to see where we are headed in the future.
Monogenic diseases
While most diseases stem from a combination of many genes, behaviors, and environmental factors, some rare conditions are caused by a single change in our genetic code. We call these monogenic diseases.
Sickle cell disease is a monogenic disorder that affects red blood cells, causing them to become misshapen due to a single nucleotide change.
So how do we track our health to build this trajectory? In short, we collect data about ourselves. New technologies are allowing us to gather a continuously broader picture of the different systems within our body to capture how they impact our health. The various aspects we measure help explain the intricate and ongoing interaction between our genome, our behavior, and our environment. To effectively track these relationships over time, we use so-called “biomarkers” that provide insight into the various aspects of our health. Biomarkers can be individual molecules like glucose or complex machines like proteins that help us monitor how well different parts of our bodies are functioning. The more data we gather, the more complete perspective we will have of our past and future health trajectory.
When it comes to disease and illness, the potential for effective treatment—and even a cure—is much greater the sooner we can administer the treatment. However, often by the time a disease manifests, it is later in the trajectory of disease progression. This delay may result in more difficulties treating a condition—but it may also result in the spread of disease to other parts of the body, ultimately leading to more damage and complications.
For many chronic conditions (those that persist for more than 3 months), early detection can allow prevention of disease altogether. Unfortunately, early detection and prevention of disease is not often what occurs in conventional healthcare systems, as the focus tends to be on reacting to existing disease as opposed to preventing future disease.