I appreciate the systemic concern around these things but every time I see this response I see it as todays thinking applied to tomorrows world.
Right now, we have so few data points that we have little idea about the natural rhythms and variations of our body chemistry - just like how we have static imaging techniques but almost never any imaging of our bodies in motion. We have this really static view of all aspects of our bodies, coupled with 'normal' ranges that may not be our own normal. If we choose to do a bunch of tests on a perfectly healthy person, there's something bound to be outside normal. Applying todays thinking, that's a patient over-diagnosis problem as you say.
However, if we're gathering frequent data from lots of people, we'll be able to approach diagnosis differently. We'll have a new, deeper understanding of the variance in our bodies, and its unlikely one area of bloodwork getting outside normal range is going to cause alarm - we'll be used to this (and normal ranges themselves will change). These data might result in health care providers recommending some minor preventative medicine course-correction, but if the data gathering is frequent enough, we'll have much better ability to understand when something is truly problematic that requires expensive & risky treatment. In that respect, frequent testing can lead to less expensive/risky over-treatment than today's world of infrequent sampling, and more cheap/minor nutritional/activity/etc interventions backed by data.
I think the concern behind your statement is that the current system isn't going to be able to easily adapt to this new approach, and in the meantime there's going to be some over-diagnosis until the medical system can wrap its head around a new data-rich approach to things. The desire by patients to understand and optimize their health is going to be the driver here.
Right now, we have so few data points that we have little idea about the natural rhythms and variations of our body chemistry - just like how we have static imaging techniques but almost never any imaging of our bodies in motion. We have this really static view of all aspects of our bodies, coupled with 'normal' ranges that may not be our own normal. If we choose to do a bunch of tests on a perfectly healthy person, there's something bound to be outside normal. Applying todays thinking, that's a patient over-diagnosis problem as you say.
However, if we're gathering frequent data from lots of people, we'll be able to approach diagnosis differently. We'll have a new, deeper understanding of the variance in our bodies, and its unlikely one area of bloodwork getting outside normal range is going to cause alarm - we'll be used to this (and normal ranges themselves will change). These data might result in health care providers recommending some minor preventative medicine course-correction, but if the data gathering is frequent enough, we'll have much better ability to understand when something is truly problematic that requires expensive & risky treatment. In that respect, frequent testing can lead to less expensive/risky over-treatment than today's world of infrequent sampling, and more cheap/minor nutritional/activity/etc interventions backed by data.
I think the concern behind your statement is that the current system isn't going to be able to easily adapt to this new approach, and in the meantime there's going to be some over-diagnosis until the medical system can wrap its head around a new data-rich approach to things. The desire by patients to understand and optimize their health is going to be the driver here.