Hi @brenda88, I've had drug-gene testing, and it saved my life last year. Since childhood, I always had weird reactions to medications... some adverse but also many strange, atypical, and/or unexpected reactions. I have never received much pain relief from Percocet or Vicodin, and I would feel loopy from pain meds that normally don't make you feel this way. I gain weight *very* quickly when taking Nexium and all other proton pump inhibitors. I would experience ovarian cysts when taking citalopram. I would always get canker sores when taking Vitamin C. If I took the drug Cafergot for migraine headaches, the headaches wouldn't go away, but I would be awake for two-days-straight.

So, when I started going to Mayo Clinic in late 2015, and I was taking 12 medications at the time, I asked them to evaluate me for drug hypersensitivity (not evening knowing if that was a thing), and I'm so glad I did!

The first set of nine tests I had done at Mayo in March 2016 yielded seven polymorphisms (which from what I learned is a lot), and it enabled us to figure out that *many* of the medications I had been taking for up to 12 years were actually what were causing many of my illness symptoms because I don't normally-metabolize them. (For most medications, I metabolize them too slowly, which made them build-up in my body). Medications that were making me ill were Metoprolol, Adderall, Nexium (and all other proton pump inhibitors), Cymbalta, Prozac, and many more. My symptoms included: continual weight gain and inability to lose weight, profuse sweating for no reason, chronic body-wide pain, horrible headaches, body-wide edema, liver pain and enlargement, borderline low blood sugar, ovarian cysts, horrible acne, and more. Ironically, my doctors at home were treating these very symptoms with the medications that were actually causing them. After finding alternatives to treat my "real" medical issues, I was able to cease many of these medications and many of my symptoms simply disappeared.

I had another set of 22 tests done this past March 2017 by OneOme, a Mayo-affiliated company. Some were repeats of the original nine, but this yielded even more results that now enable me to further-expand my list of drugs to avoid.

For instance, I learned that I don't properly-metabolize pretty much all infectious disease medications, which in turn has given me the knowledge to know that I shouldn't travel in certain parts of the world. I learned that the reason I feel little-to-no pain relief from percocet, etc. is because I'm a slow metabolizer of all drugs metabolized by that liver enzyme. I learned that if I am given the cancer-fighting drug tamoxifen after I reach menopause, it can actually cause me to have cancer. I learned that if I am given the drug allopurinol, my dermal layers will separate causing Stevens-Johnson Syndrome, which could kill me. Interestingly, I learned that I'm a slow metabolizer of caffeine.

I just met with one of my Mayo doctors last week, and he and I remain stunned that none of my 20 doctors at home realized what was happening to me because even if I didn't have polymorphisms, I was taking so many medications that I was absolutely experiencing drug-drug interactions. (Many/most drugs are metabolized by the cytochrome P450 liver enzyme system, and there are many drugs and foods that inhibit these enzymes to work more slowly or induce them to work more quickly that normal, which them causes the enzymes to too-slowly or too-rapidly metabolize their substrate medications.)

The pricing is decreasing... my original nine tests done at Mayo were a little under $2,900; I wasn't able to get insurance to cover them, but many people do. This was done via a blood draw at Mayo. With that said, my more recent OneOme 22-test set was only $249 and done via mail order once my doctor contacted them. I only had to swab my gums and they paid to FedEx it back. Mayo and OneOme have been working diligently at lowering prices, and OneOme has been working to gain certification on a state-by-state basis.

Thank you for the info. I will check into this.

Very interesting and scary! I may have a trip to Mayo in my near future, I will ask them about it. Thank you very much for the info!