Jack Doughery says deCODEme genetic test was an investment

Jack Doughery feels great and wants everyone to know it.

“I almost feel evangelical about my health,” says the 62-year-old businessman from Spokane, Washington. “I’m so excited about what can happen if you do the right things and have the right tools.”

Jack started doing the right things once he began what he calls his journey, which kicked off one day after waking up at three in the morning craving a cigarette.

“When you’re waking up at three in the morning, coughing and spluttering, and the only way to calm down is by smoking a cigarette, you don’t have to be too smart to know this might not be the way to go. It got my attention,” he remembers.

One of Jack’s first stops along his grand trip was at Spokane’s Heart Attack and Stroke Prevention Clinic, run by nurse practitioner Amy Doneen. It was Doneen and Dr. Bradley Bale who put Jack on the path to prevention, helping Jack to reshape his life using diagnostic testing, nutrition and exercise.

Recently, Amy Doneen began using a new test to help alter Jack’s journey—deCODEme, a genetic test that scans a patient’s genome for markers relating to 30 various diseases. The deCODEme genetic test gauges a patient’s average and lifetime risk of developing diseases such as Alzheimer’s, heart attack, prostate cancer, and most recently bladder cancer.

“I’m no doctor,” Jack says. “But in laymen’s terms, the tool is another arrow in Dr. Bale’s quiver to help me do the right things.”

Jack hasn’t always done the right things. In addition to his a two-pack-a-day habit, he often drank copious amounts of alcohol. He was, in his own words, in “bad shape.” Even the death of his father at the early age of 62 didn’t alter the trajectory of his unhealthy lifestyle.

“Back then, I thought 62 was old. Now that I’m 62, I’ve changed my mind.”

deCODEme genetic test customer Jack Doughery

Children often pick up their parents’ habits, and so it was for Jack. One of those habits was a breakfast straight from the heart-attack diet.

“We ate bacon, sausage, eggs, all fried and cooked in lard. We had biscuits, gravy and maybe some peach or cherry cobbler,” he says, and then to make sure he’s understood, he emphasizes: “I’m still talking about breakfast. I haven’t moved on.”

Pulling no punches, this eat-everything diet made Jack—”fat.”

“I was one large unit,” he remembers. “I weighed 197 pounds in the eighth grade. I had to breathe hard just trying to walk.”

That changed when Jack discovered girls. Realizing that most girls weren’t interested in boys that looked like him, he began eating nothing but cottage cheese and lost 60 pounds in 90 days.

“I think I was the first person to invent the Atkins diet,” Jack says with a laugh, referring to the popular diet consisting of high protein and low carbohydrates.

But the weight loss was only temporary. Jack continued to smoke and drink and the pounds piled back on. Jack says that he didn’t really take control of his health until he started a family. It was then he realized that he wanted to be around to see his grandchildren. So he quit smoking and drinking all in one day and began an exercise program. This, he recalls, was his first investment in his own health.

“I weighed over 200 pounds. Now I weigh 166 pounds. I wanted to make sure when I was older I was living a quality life rather than just trying to make it.”

Helping Jack live a quality life are Dr. Bradley Bald and Amy Doneen, who discovered that Jack was loaded up with arterial plaque. When Jack was only 52, his vein age was 70. Today, after they helped Jack remake his lifestyle, Jack’s vein age is 49. Dr. Bale and Doneen helped improve Jack’s health by putting Jack on an exercise and nutrition program and by prescribing medication that reduced his cholesterol levels.

“Dr. Bale totally turned my life around.”

But getting Jack back in shape required more than fixing his weight and reducing the accumulation of plaque in his blood vessels. Even after these changes, Amy Doneen recommended that Jack go even further and take the deCODEme genetic test. By that time, Jack had been working with The Heart Attack Prevention Clinic for years and was in great shape. He’d step on the treadmill, and raise the pace and incline, but Jack kept going. He’d ace the stress test every time.

“If you looked at me you’d say, wow, that guy is in great shape.”

But the deCODEme test revealed something that had previously remained hidden. Jack had a significantly higher than average risk of developing diabetes. This was a louder alarm than the 3-am cigarette.

“Diabetes. That’s what killed my dad,” Jack laments.

While the result scared Jack, he says that he was quickly comforted by the fact that he knew his vulnerabilities and that enabled him to take extra preventative precautions. The test, he says, was well worth the $1000 he paid for his results.

But let’s face it. The economy is tight. Gas prices are going through the roof. Food prices keep rising. Health insurance costs are out of control. Some potential patients look at the cost of the test and wonder if it’s worth the money. After all, not everyone is a successful businessman and public speaker like Jack. But Jack has a simple answer for them.

“I was talking to my brother about this very thing. I told him, ‘Is your life worth $1000?’ Now that might not be something a doctor can say, but that’s my opinion. I think people have to look at it in perspective. They wouldn’t even blink at spending that much on a big-screen TV. And they’ll even put it on a credit card and pay for it over 30 years. So what’s the priority? I don’t look at the test as spending money. The deCODEme test is an investment in yourself.”

Jack takes the money out of the equation. His thoughts turn to his four grandchildren. He wants to watch them grow up. He understands deCODEme’s genetic test is not a silver bullet, and won’t enable him to avoid all illnesses. It’s another tool, or as Jack repeats, another arrow in Doneen and Dr. Bale’s quiver.

“It gives Dr. Bale another awesome tool to assist me on this awesome journey. And at 62 here I am. I feel fantastic.”

Jack Doughery's genetic test showed that he had a significantly higher than average risk of developing diabetes.