Measuring Breath Ketones to Evaluate Your Low Carb Diet

June 26, 2020

Trey Suntrup, PhD is a product engineer who earned his doctorate in physics and electrical engineering from the University of California, Santa Barbara in 2015. He is currently the Head of Product at Readout Health, the St. Louis startup that recently launched the Biosense breath ketone meter. Following a successful clinical trial in the autumn of 2019, Biosense has entered the consumer, clinical, and research market as a tool to help those wanting to lose weight or manage blood glucose with a ketogenic diet.

On this podcast, Trey discusses breath acetone testing and how it can be used to improve health outcomes. He shares the results of the clinical trial supporting the Biosense meter, including the finding that measurements must be collected multiple times daily to truly evaluate the benefit of a ketogenic or intermittent fasting plan. He also describes some of the advantages of breath testing over blood ketone measurement. 

Here’s the outline of this interview with Trey Suntrup:

[00:00:15] James McCarter; Podcasts: How to Reverse Insulin Resistant Type Two Diabetes in 100 Million People in Less Than 10 Years and Nutritional Ketosis and Guided Behavior Change to Reverse Type 2 Diabetes. 

[00:00:20] Virta Health.

[00:00:23] Douglas Hilbert; Podcast: How Busy Realtors Can Avoid Anxiety and Depression Without Prescriptions or the Help of a Doctor.

[00:01:02] Trey's background.

[00:04:16] NBT Podcasts on ketosis and ketones with Dominic D'Agostino, Ken Ford, Brianna Stubbs 1, 2, 3, 4; Catherine Crofts, Megan Hall.

[00:04:29] Megan Hall’s Study: Roberts, Megan N., et al. "A ketogenic diet extends longevity and healthspan in adult mice." Cell metabolism 26.3 (2017): 539-546.

[00:04:52] Types of ketones and methods for measuring them.

[00:10:03] Study of endurance runners in ketosis: Edwards, Kate H., Bradley T. Elliott, and Cecilia M. Kitic. "Carbohydrate intake and ketosis in self-sufficient multi-stage ultramarathon runners." Journal of Sports Sciences 38.4 (2020): 366-374.

[00:11:37] Problems with measuring BHB blood ketones.

[00:15:49] Deriving meaning from acetone meter results; The ACEs Unit.

[00:21:49] Clinical trial: Suntrup, Donald J., et al. "Characterization of a high-resolution breath acetone meter for ketosis monitoring." medRxiv (2020). Interpretation of trial results.

[00:26:15] Ken Ford on the signalling properties of ketones: STEM-Talk Podcast Episode 50: Ken Ford Talks about Ketosis, Optimizing Exercise, and the Future Direction of Science, Technology, and Culture.

[00:26:26] Ketogains: Chase results, not ketones.

[00:29:29] Early Time-Restricted Eating, Intermittent Fasting. Review: Mattson, Mark P., Valter D. Longo, and Michelle Harvie. "Impact of intermittent fasting on health and disease processes." Ageing research reviews 39 (2017): 46-58.

[00:32:43] Biosense blog post: The Effects and Impact of Ketones and Fasting.

[00:33:13] Marty Kendall’s blog post: Is the acetone:glucose ratio the Holy Grail of tracking optimal ketosis levels?

[00:33:56] Continuous glucose monitors (CGM).

[00:35:16] Integration with Cronometer.

[00:35:48] Heads up Health; NBT podcast w/ founder David Korsunsky: How to Use Data to Take Control of Your Health.

[00:38:25] Senza app.

[00:40:52] Getting the biosense meter: Biosense website.

[00:42:10] Upcoming clinical trials.

[00:46:45] Find Trey on LinkedIn.