🌱 Plant-Based & Vegetarian Check
For everyone · 9 markers · $211.45
with code CAMERON $234.95
Vegan, vegetarian, or mostly plant-based — whether you've been doing it a decade or three months.
🩸 Order this exact panel — 10% off
All 9 markers load into your cart in one click. No doctor's visit, drawn at any Quest location in the US, results by email in about two weeks. Code CAMERON applies automatically.
Add all 9 markers — $211.45 → Open the full Bloodwork Vault →Why this panel
A well-planned plant-based diet is genuinely healthy, and the honest version of this is that it runs short on a small, specific and entirely predictable list of nutrients. This panel checks that list rather than the vague 'are you getting enough protein' conversation, which is rarely the actual problem.
What this panel can settle, and by what logic
Nine tests aimed at the four nutrients a plant-based diet actually runs short of. Each is paired with the marker that makes it interpretable.
- Vitamin B12 with Methylmalonic Acid (MMA) and Homocysteine is the centerpiece, and it is three tests because one is not enough. Serum B12 measures circulation, methylmalonic acid measures whether the B12-dependent enzyme step is failing, and homocysteine rises when either B12 or folate is short Harrington 2024. A B12 of 300 pg/mL with a normal MMA is sufficiency; the same 300 with a raised MMA is not.
- Ferritin with the Iron Panel (Iron, TIBC, Transferrin Saturation) and Complete Blood Count (CBC) with Differential addresses a genuinely higher requirement. Plant iron is non-heme and less available, so stores run lower for the same intake, and the ferritin is what shows depletion before hemoglobin moves Cancado 2025. The red-cell indices also flag the case that looks like iron deficiency and is thalassemia trait, which needs a different answer Xiao 2021.
- Zinc, Plasma is here because phytate is. Whole grains and legumes bind zinc and reduce absorption, which raises the requirement — while plasma zinc remains a coarse index of status Ceballos-Rasgado 2024.
- Iodine is on the list because vegans are the group most likely to be short of it. Urinary iodine concentrations are lower in vegans than in lacto-ovo vegetarians or pescatarians Henjum 2023, and dairy and seafood are the two main dietary sources being removed.
What it cannot settle, and what would
It cannot tell you whether your diet is adequate, only whether four things are low. The nutrients a plant-based diet most often misses and this panel does not measure: long-chain omega-3, where the test is an EPA and DHA index; selenium, which runs lower in vegans in the same comparison that found the iodine difference Henjum 2023; and calcium, vitamin K2, choline and total protein, none of which has a marker here.
Serum Iodine is the wrong measurement for the right concern. Iodine status is assessed on urinary excretion, and even that describes populations better than people — pinning down one individual's habitual intake takes around ten repeat collections König 2011. Treat a single serum value as a prompt to look at your diet, not as a result.
If you already supplement B12, this panel cannot tell you whether you needed to. Serum B12 responds quickly to oral dosing and a normal value in a supplemented person says only that the supplement is working today Harrington 2024. That is worth knowing and is a different question from tissue reserve.
And it cannot assess bone. Fracture risk in this population is the outcome that has actually been observed, and it is measured with DEXA and a dietary calcium intake, neither of which is blood.
Draw conditions that decide whether the money is wasted
Four preparations, ranked by how much of the panel each protects.
- Hold B12 and any B-complex for a week — but only if you want to know your reserve. If instead you want to check that your current regimen is working, keep taking it and read Methylmalonic Acid (MMA) rather than serum B12, since MMA reflects function instead of the last dose Harrington 2024. Decide which question you are asking before you book.
- Stop oral iron 5 to 7 days before. Serum iron and transferrin saturation on the Iron Panel (Iron, TIBC, Transferrin Saturation) track the last tablet; Ferritin tracks the store, which is what you are buying Cancado 2025.
- Fasted and early for the Zinc, Plasma. Plasma zinc falls after a meal and across the day Ceballos-Rasgado 2024, so a late non-fasted sample produces an apparent deficiency in a diet already suspected of causing one.
- Not within 2 weeks of an illness. Inflammation inflates ferritin and depresses zinc at the same time Luo 2023, which is the exact combination of errors that sends a vegan to the wrong supplement.
How you would know it answered your question, and what each pattern means next
Four results, each with an interval set by the nutrient rather than by convenience.
- Methylmalonic Acid (MMA) raised with a low or low-normal Vitamin B12: increase the dose or change the route, then recheck MMA at 4 weeks, because MMA falls once the enzyme step is supplied and serum B12 would only report the tablet Harrington 2024.
- Ferritin under 30 ng/mL: treat, take it with a source of vitamin C to improve non-heme absorption, and retest at 12 weeks rather than at 4 Cancado 2025.
- Microcytosis with a normal ferritin: do not add iron. Ask about thalassemia trait, which the red-cell indices and formulas distinguish from iron deficiency Xiao 2021.
- Homocysteine above 10 µmol/L with a normal B12: look at folate status, which red-cell folate reflects over a longer window than serum folate Qi 2024, and recheck at 12 weeks.
Sources read for these sections
- Harrington DJ. The application and interpretation of laboratory biomarkers for the evaluation of vitamin B12 status. Annals of Clinical Biochemistry 2024 · PMID 39367523
- Henjum S, et al. Thyroid function and urinary concentrations of iodine, selenium, and arsenic in vegans, lacto-ovo vegetarians and pescatarians. European Journal of Nutrition 2023 · PMID 37592132
- König F, et al. Ten repeat collections for urinary iodine from spot samples or 24-hour samples are needed to reliably estimate individual iodine status in women. Journal of Nutrition 2011 · PMID 21918061
- Cancado RD. Defining Global Thresholds for Serum Ferritin: A Challenging Mission in Establishing the Iron Deficiency Diagnosis in This Era of Striving for Health Equity. Diagnostics (Basel) 2025 · PMID 39941219
- Ceballos-Rasgado M, et al. Methods of Assessment of Zinc Status in Humans: An Updated Review and Meta-analysis. Nutrition Reviews 2024 · PMID 38917458
- Luo H, et al. A Practical Guide to Adjust Micronutrient Biomarkers for Inflammation Using the BRINDA Method. Journal of Nutrition 2023 · PMID 36792034
- Qi YP, et al. Folate and vitamin B12 status and predicted neural tube defects risk among nonpregnant women of reproductive age from the Malawi National Micronutrient Survey, 2015-2016. Birth Defects Research 2024 · PMID 38526193
- Xiao H, et al. Differential diagnosis of thalassemia and iron deficiency anemia in pregnant women using new formulas from multidimensional analysis of red blood cells. Annals of Translational Medicine 2021 · PMID 33569443
The 9 markers — and why each one is here
What this panel is ordered to decide
A panel is a set of numbers until it settles something. These are the decisions this one feeds — each links the pathway it belongs to, what that pathway claims, and what its test list is read for.
Check these before buying a nootropic. B12 deficiency produces exactly the symptom picture racetams are sold for, serum B12 misses it, and MMA is the test that doesn't.
A multivitamin is a hedge against gaps you haven't measured. This panel tells you which gaps are real — and RBC values beat serum for zinc, magnesium and folate, because serum is defended at the expense of tissue.
Related panels
A panel gives you numbers. Skool is where they get read — 103 marker breakdowns with the optimal range rather than just the lab range, 42 evidence-graded protocols, and me answering questions daily. $10/mo, cancel anytime.
Join Skool — $10/mo →Frequently asked questions
9 markers: Vitamin B12, Methylmalonic Acid (MMA), Ferritin, Iron Panel (Iron, TIBC, UIBC, Sat%), Vitamin D (25-Hydroxy), Zinc, Plasma, Iodine, Homocysteine, Complete Blood Count (CBC) w/ Differential.
$234.95 before discount, $211.45 with code CAMERON applied automatically. Individual markers add a one-time $10 draw fee. Ordered through Marek Diagnostics and drawn at any Quest Diagnostics location in the US.
No. These are ordered direct-to-consumer through Marek Diagnostics — you order online, walk into a Quest location, and results are emailed to you in about two weeks. No physician visit or insurance required. Not available in NY, NJ or RI.
Morning, fasted. Off any B-complex or biotin supplement for 72 hours — it distorts both B12 and thyroid results.
Raised MMA with a 'normal' B12 means real deficiency — act on it. Ferritin under 30 needs iron, taken with vitamin C and away from tea and coffee, which block non-heme absorption hard. Low iodine → check thyroid. Raised homocysteine suggests B12, folate or B6 shortfall. Folate is usually excellent on this diet and calcium is often fine — this panel is as much about what you can stop worrying about.
Where this goes next
The pages here are the frameworks. The protocols — the dosing, the order to correct things in, the week-by-week schedule and what to retest — are inside Skool.