Gut microbiome stool test

What is a gut microbiome test?

Your gut is home to a large community of bacteria and other microbes, called the gut microbiome. A gut microbiome test reads the microbial DNA in a small stool sample. The lab then reports which microbes it found, each as a share of the total.

New Dawn Health offers the FloraUp® Microbiome Gut Health Analysis at iHope Clinic in Taipei. The clinic provides the stool kit and sends the sample to a laboratory for next-generation sequencing (NGS). The package description lists these report sections:

• Enterotype: the broad community type your sample resembles
• Beneficial and harmful bacteria: the balance between groups the report labels each way
• Synthesis capability: for short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs) and for vitamins
• Intestinal age and a health-risk assessment

16S or shotgun: which kind of sequencing?

Labs sequence stool in one of two ways. An international expert consensus published in 2025 accepts both, with different strengths:

Which method this test uses is confirmed when you book. It decides how fine-grained the report can be.

What can a stool microbiome test tell you today?

It can describe which microbes were in one sample. Turning that description into health advice is where the evidence runs out.

The 2025 consensus was written by 69 experts from 18 countries and published in The Lancet Gastroenterology & Hepatology. It found no direct evidence that microbiome tests improve how patients are managed.

What each part of the report can mean

Would another lab read the same sample the same way?

Not reliably. In a 2026 study led by the US National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), seven consumer testing services each received three kits of the same well-mixed stool. What came back:

• Differences between services were as large as differences between different people.
• Depending on the service, the same material was reported to hold from 20 to 1,701 species.
• One service called the same material healthy twice and unhealthy once.

Is there a "normal" gut microbiome?

Not one that science can define today. The Human Microbiome Project found that the main gut microbes vary widely in kind and amount, even among healthy people.

What those microbes can do varied much less: different mixes of species carried similar sets of metabolic pathways. Expert reviews since then agree:

• No agreed healthy composition: a 2024 review in Science found no consensus on what a healthy microbiome looks like, in any population.
• No strict reference ranges: the 2025 consensus says there is not enough information to set healthy ranges for each species.
• No agreed definition of imbalance: "dysbiosis", the term for an unbalanced microbiome, has no common definition.

Is it a test for colorectal cancer or infection?

No. A general microbiome profile does not screen for cancer, and it does not diagnose infection. Each of those questions has its own test.

How is the colon screened instead?

Taiwan's free FIT is for people with National Health Insurance, who collect the tube at a contracted clinic. The gastrointestinal health page covers colon and stomach screening in more detail.

Research is testing purpose-built panels of stool bacteria for colorectal cancer. An Asia-Pacific guideline (APAGE–APSDE, 2023) says panels including Fusobacterium nucleatum have potential to screen for advanced colon growths. If the FloraUp® risk assessment mentions colorectal cancer, ask which validated panel it uses.

Infections need their own tests

Infections that cause diarrhea are found with targeted tests that a doctor orders. A stool culture, for example, looks for germs behind severe bloody diarrhea with fever, or diarrhea that will not go away. The consensus calls culture and PCR panels the tools for finding specific germs, distinct from microbiome profiling.

Who might consider it, and who should start elsewhere?

The package description suggests the test for people with irregular eating, digestive discomfort, long-term medicines, or curiosity about their health. The consensus is narrower: it suggests that a doctor or another licensed professional, such as a dietitian, requests the test.

How do I prepare and collect the sample?

1. 1
   When you book

   Tell your coordinator about any antibiotics in the past three months, and every probiotic, prebiotic and supplement you take. Expert consensus asks testing providers to record these.
2. 2
   In the days before

   Keep your usual diet and medicines. Expert consensus advises against stopping a therapy or changing your diet unless your doctor says so, because it gives a false picture.
3. 3
   Collecting the sample

   Follow the kit instructions so the sample is not contaminated. Note the time you collected it and how it was stored.
4. 4
   Returning the kit

   Return it within the time the kit allows. Your coordinator confirms where and when to hand it in.

Antibiotics and probiotics

Antibiotics reshape the gut microbiome for weeks. In a 2018 study, 12 healthy men took a 4-day course of three last-resort antibiotics. Researchers then followed their gut microbes for six months:

• Bifidobacterium species and butyrate-producing bacteria were depleted at first.
• The community returned close to its starting mix within about 1.5 months.
• Nine common species were still undetectable in most of the men after six months.

So a sample taken soon after antibiotics shows a recovering microbiome, not your usual one. Ask the clinic whether to wait, and never cut a prescribed course short for the test. Probiotics and supplements are recorded rather than stopped, unless your doctor advises otherwise.

At home or at the clinic?

Expert consensus expects stool to be collected at home, into a tube with a DNA preservative. Stool without a preservative has to be shipped within 24 hours on ice or dry ice, and is more prone to error.

The package lists a duration of 30 minutes. For a visitor to Taipei, three details are confirmed when you book:

• Whether you collect the sample at the clinic, or later at your hotel with the kit
• How many hours you have to return it, and whether it must stay cool
• Whether a kit can travel home with you and be sent back

What can a result sensibly change, and what should it not drive?

Diet can change the gut microbiome's makeup, the consensus notes. In a 2014 study in Nature, a short switch to an all-plant or all-animal diet changed which gut bacteria thrived.

The effects are not always the expected ones. In a 17-week randomized study, a high-fermented-food diet raised microbiome diversity, while a high-fiber diet left it unchanged.

What are the risks?

Collecting a stool sample carries no physical risk. The risks come from what a report leads people to do:

• Wrong conclusions: self-misdiagnosis, and delay in seeking medical care, as a 2024 review in Science describes.
• Swapped treatment: taking supplements in place of prescription medicines, from the same review.
• Upselling: about 45% of the 31 consumer testing companies that review identified sell supplements they recommend from results.
• Privacy: shotgun data can include some of your own DNA. The consensus says providers should explain whether data may be sold, mined for research or used to train AI.

How much does it cost, and is it covered?

The live price further down this page is the booking price at New Dawn Health for the FloraUp® analysis at iHope Clinic. Any consultation beyond it is confirmed when you book.

• Tests in Taiwan are self-funded for visitors. Short-term visitors are not covered by Taiwan's National Health Insurance, so this test is self-funded.
• Reimbursement at home is a question for your insurer. A plan may treat a self-requested microbiome test differently from one a doctor orders. Ask them before you book.

When do results come, and what happens next?

1. 1
   The report

   Turnaround, report language and who explains the results are confirmed when you book. Ask for a copy you can keep, and for the raw sequence data, which the consensus says can be shared on request.
2. 2
   In Taiwan

   If the clinic offers a results consultation, ask which findings, if any, need medical follow-up.
3. 3
   If a disease-causing microbe is listed

   Show the report to a doctor rather than treating yourself. The doctor decides whether a targeted test is needed.
4. 4
   Back home

   Take the report to your own doctor. Most doctors are not trained to read microbiome reports, the consensus notes, so ask what a result would change before acting on it.
5. 5
   New or worsening symptoms

   See a doctor, whatever the report says.

What should I ask iHope Clinic before booking?

Ask your coordinator to confirm these before you book:

• Is the sequencing 16S or shotgun, and how deep is it?
• Which laboratory runs the test, and which accreditation does it hold?
• Do I collect the sample at the clinic or at my hotel, and how fast must it be returned?
• How long after antibiotics should I wait?
• How are the enterotype, intestinal age, SCFA, vitamin and risk scores calculated, and what study validated them?
• Which comparison group defines “normal” in the report?
• Does the report recommend products, and does the testing company sell them?
• When is the report ready, in what language, and who explains it?
• Can I have the raw sequence data, is human DNA removed, and can my data be sold or used for research?