STUDself · Numbers
Big bloodwork panels
Also known as
Function Health · Superpower · 100 biomarker panel · longevity bloodwork
Community talk may be wrong. Not medical or health advice. No result or safety is promised.
In brief
Function, Superpower and similar services sell broad packages of blood tests with reports covering many markers.
The common picture
One big panel, one PDFFunction, Superpower, and lookalikes.
Hundreds of dollarsPrice is part of the talk, not a shop rank.
Then a human who can read itThe PDF is not the plan.
A handful of markers they actually trackNot all 100+.
Repeat talk: 6–12 monthsThe report describes a yearly or twice-yearly panel, with earlier testing when separately arranged.
ApoB, ferritin, A1c, thyroid, vitamins as usual starsThe rest is noise until someone circles it.
People describe wanting more detail than a routine physical provided, then working out which results matter to their situation. Cost, repeat testing and finding someone to interpret a long report are recurring parts of the existing notes.
Good to know. A long PDF is a starting point. Bring it to someone who can interpret it.
What people say
- The job: A wider blood draw than a routine physical when people felt dismissed.
- Why it’s loud: Function’s 2025 funding wave and Superpower rivalry live on r/Function_Health and X.
- What you get: a long PDF. What you still need: a clinician.
- Ulta / Quest / Labcorp add-ons are the unglamorous cousins.
- This page does not rank vendors as medicine.
How people do it
- Circle 5–8 markers they already care about before the email arrives.
- Book the follow-up the same week.
- Don’t order a second brand to “compare truth.”
- If something is flagged, they treat it like a lab, not a personality.
Amounts people use
- Cost talk: often hundreds of USD per draw.
- Marker counts: 100+ on ads; people use a handful.
- Repeat: 6–12 months unless a clinician said sooner.
How people keep it
- Small version: one panel, one reader.
- First week: don’t buy a stack off the PDF.
- They track: the circled markers.
- It fades when: the PDF becomes a shopping list.
How it may feel
- Waiting for results: over-research.
- A clean PDF: relief, then they have to live.
- A wall of yellow flags: panic unless a person translates.
How long
- A yearly or twice-yearly object, not a weekly score.
The longer notes
- How the megapanel week actually unfolds in public rooms: Someone hears a Function or Superpower ad on a podcast, screenshots a friend’s hundred-marker PDF, or lands on r/Function_Health after a “normal” physical that never measured ApoB. They book a draw, wait for the kit or the phlebotomy slot, and then live in email for a few days while refreshing tracking pages. When the report lands it is longer than any annual physical they remember, color bands and summary scores and all. The first hour is usually not calm reading — it is tab-hopping between reference ranges, Discord screenshots, and whichever AI summary the app shoved above the fold. People who keep their heads circle five to eight markers they already cared about before the cart opened — ApoB, ferritin, A1c or fasting glucose, TSH, sometimes vitamin D or a sex-hormone block — and treat the rest as background noise until a human who can order follow-up looks at the slip without panic. That is the week forums describe over and over.
- What “my physical was normal” really means in this conversation: Many standard US annual panels still skip ApoB and Lp(a), which is why Attia-shaped listeners and Dayspring-adjacent clips keep getting repeated when someone is angry that everything looked fine while particle count or genetic risk was never asked. A consumer megapanel can close that gap in one draw, or it can bury the one useful number under eighty extras with “optimal” marketing bands that do not match a clinician’s ranges or guidelines people later find. Forums compare Function wait times, Superpower ads, Ulta and Quest add-ons, and Labcorp self-order menus more like product reviews than like medicine, complete with promo codes and phlebotomy horror stories. The scientific reason people bother is discordance talk — LDL-C can look okay while ApoB is not — not a brand war between logos. This map does not crown a vendor; it maps the habit of finally drawing the markers people kept asking for and then sitting with one reader instead of thirty Reddit diagnoses and a shopping cart.
- Money, membership, and the anxiety product: Cost talk on X and Reddit clusters in the hundreds of dollars per draw, sometimes with membership framing, and the comparison shopping never really ends once someone is in the loop. People who quit often say the same sentence in different words: the PDF became a shopping list rather than a plan. They ordered a second brand “to compare truth,” bought supplements off yellow flags the same night, or redrew monthly because a number moved a few points inside noise. The keepers book a follow-up the same week the email arrives, ask about the handful of markers that matter for their history, and put the full report away for months without living inside the app. Repeating the whole circus on a short clock is how the product shifts from information to a paid anxiety subscription with nicer graphics. After a medicine change or a large weight shift, a clinician may want a sooner redraw; otherwise the adult clock people describe is six to twelve months, not a weekly hobby or a personality.
- How the first two weeks after the PDF feel: Waiting for results is pure over-research, late-night abstract reading, and group-chat speculation that solves nothing. A clean report feels like relief for about a day, then life is still sleep and food and lifting and the same commute. A wall of yellow and orange flags feels like a diagnosis even when it is mostly “slightly outside a marketing band” that a clinician later shrugs at. People report sleeping worse the night they open a scary summary, then better once a human translates or dismisses half of it without selling a stack. The useful emotional arc in forums is not “I fixed my health in an app” — it is “I finally have ApoB on paper and a plan for the next year that a person signed off on.” Panic-shopping ferritin, thyroid, and testosterone stacks before a visit is the failure mode people mock in later comments when the cart receipt still stings. The boring success is one draw, five circled numbers, one conversation, then they go train.
- Soft voices and what they actually leave behind: Function’s own content, Superpower ads, Attia membership clips, and r/PeterAttia “just get the labs” threads are the soft voices people name when they explain why they spent the money. They leave behind the ask — draw ApoB, do not trust LDL-C alone, get a real follow-up — more than they leave durable brand loyalty once the novelty fades. Skeptics on the same platforms say consumer panels are expensive anxiety machines and that a targeted Quest order plus a primary-care visit answers the same questions for less theater and less color psychology. Both poles show up in the same week of someone’s feed and both can sound right about different sentences. This card steals the map of what gets measured and how people behave after the email, not a merch ranking or an affiliate table. Sibling cards on this house — ApoB, ferritin, testosterone labs, biological-age clocks, full-body MRI — are different questions; the megapanel is the bundle and the habit of not becoming a patient of the internet overnight.
- What drops out when the honeymoon ends: Subscriptions cancel when the second PDF looks like the first and nobody changed behavior between the two draws in any way that would show. People drop the app notifications, stop screenshotting every flag into the group chat, and either keep a short list of markers with a clinician or they abandon the whole theater for a cheaper annual draw that still includes the few numbers they learned to care about. Some switch to à-la-carte markers only once they know which lines matter. Others keep the brand because their group chat all uses it and the logistics of booking are easy enough to justify. What rarely survives long is reading eighty lines of “optimal” every quarter with no plan and no human translator. The drop is not usually a medical conclusion — it is boredom, cost, or the realization that the gym and sleep were always going to move more of life than a prettier PDF with more yellow ink.
- Amounts and clocks people actually name: Marker counts in ads sit at one hundred plus; people report using a handful when they are honest about what changed decisions. Dollar talk is often a few hundred per cycle depending on promo, membership tier, and whether phlebotomy is included or a surprise. Phlebotomy wait times and at-home kit friction are compared as much as science in the vendor threads. Redraw intervals people describe without a clinician override cluster around half a year to a year once the first panic settles. First-week behavior after results is the risk window for supplement carts and second opinions that are really second anxieties. None of those numbers are a protocol from this house; they are the amounts that show up when people describe their receipts and calendars in public. If a flag needs urgent care language — chest pain, severe symptoms, extreme labs — that leaves the lifestyle map entirely and becomes a person and a clinician, not a deeper brand comparison thread.
- What this map refuses to do while still being useful: It will not rank Function against Superpower as medicine, interpret a personal TSH, start a hormone, or turn a color band into a diagnosis someone wears as identity. It will not treat an AI summary as a care plan or a substitute for a licensed reader who can order the next step. It will note that papers and guidelines people pass around still care about atherogenic particles, iron status, glucose, and thyroid when symptoms or history warrant looking — and that consumer bundles are one logistics path among Ulta, Quest, Labcorp, and a standard order from a clinician who already knows the patient. The discussion-map job is simple even when the PDF is long: show how the week goes, what people circle, what they buy when scared, what they drop when bored, and why the human reader is the product people eventually admit they needed after the app hype cooled.
- How a 100-marker week actually goes: They pick a vendor because a podcast or a friend did, they book a draw, and a week later a PDF lands in email with more yellow flags than a physical ever showed. The useful move is circling ApoB, ferritin, A1c or glucose, TSH, and maybe vitamin D or testosterone before opening the shopping tab. Function’s 2025 funding story and Superpower ads made the bundle a personality; r/Function_Health compares phlebotomy and wait times, not medical truth. Ulta, Quest, and Labcorp add-ons can ask the same five questions for less theater. A clinician who will look at the slip is the product; the app’s “optimal” band is marketing. Repeating the whole circus monthly is how people buy anxiety instead of a plan.
- What “normal physical” missed: Many US annual panels still skip ApoB and Lp(a), which is why Attia-shaped listeners show up angry that everything was “normal.” A consumer megapanel can close that gap or bury the one number under eighty extras. Discordance between LDL-C and ApoB is the scientific reason the extra ask exists, not a brand war. If the PDF flags thirty things, they book one visit rather than thirty Reddit threads. This card will not rank Function against Superpower as medicine.
- What changed in 2025–26: Function Health’s raise and Superpower’s consumer ads made “100+ markers at home” a personality. Reddit rooms compare wait times, phlebotomy, and whether the app’s AI summary scared them. The useful residue is not the brand — it is whether ApoB, ferritin, A1c, TSH, and a few others finally got drawn and read by a human.
- Why a physical felt thin: many US annual labs still skip ApoB and Lp(a). People who listen to Attia / Dayspring show up angry that “everything was normal” on a panel that never asked the question. A big consumer panel can close that gap — or dump 80 extra numbers with no plan.
- How to read a 15-page PDF without becoming a patient of the internet: circle the handful you came for, ignore the “optimal” color scale if it disagrees with your clinician, and book a visit before you open a cart. Reference ranges differ. “Optimal” on an app is a marketing band.
- Repeats and money: doing this monthly is how people buy anxiety. After a medicine or a big weight change, a clinician may want a sooner redraw. Otherwise a long interval is the adult clock.
- Siblings: ApoB, ferritin, testosterone labs, biological-age tests, Prenuvo-style MRI. Each is a different question. This card is the *bundle* and the *habit of not shopping the PDF.*
- Soft voices: Function’s own content, Superpower ads, Attia members, r/PeterAttia “just get the labs.” Steal the ask, not the merch.
- What this card will not do: pick a winner between vendors, interpret your TSH, or start a hormone.
- A boring success: one draw, five circled numbers, one conversation, then they go lift and sleep.
Good to know
- Not a diagnosis engine.
- Out-of-range panic + random supplements is the fail.
Earlier wording (updated)
- Repeat on a months-to-year clock Not a weekly hobby.