The complete guide to the 360 health panel

Your standard draw at the GP answers one question: are you ill? A broad health panel answers a different one: how is your whole system doing, before anything breaks? That difference decides which markers you measure, and why a 360 panel is more than a long list of tubes.

I think a broad panel only earns its place if you can read it by system. Forty loose values tell you nothing; four or five systems that contradict or confirm each other, that is data you can steer on.

What is a 360 health panel?

A 360 panel is a broad blood test that maps several body systems at once: your heart and fat metabolism, your sugar handling, your hormones, your liver and kidneys, your blood count and your stores such as iron and vitamins. Where a targeted test asks one question, a broad panel sketches a starting point across the board.

The idea is not "more is better". The idea is coverage: every major system gets at least one marker that flags it early. That way you see a shift in your sugar handling or your fat particles before a classic disease threshold comes into view.

What does the panel cover per body system?

The easiest way to read a broad panel is by system. This table links each body system to the marker group that maps it and to what that group tells you.

Why broad testing says more than one marker

One abnormal value is a question, not an answer. It only gains meaning in context. A raised gamma-GT means something different in an athlete with a normal fat profile than in someone with high triglycerides and a creeping HbA1c. The Dutch Heart Foundation (Hartstichting) stresses that cardiovascular risk is always a sum of several factors, not one number. A broad panel shows that sum in one go.

That is exactly the gain: systems talk to each other. A low testosterone value plus a rising fasting insulin plus climbing triglycerides together form a metabolic pattern you would never have seen from a single testosterone draw.

Heart and sugar: the system that tips first

In most people who optimise, the metabolic side moves first. Your fasting insulin can climb for years before your glucose or your HbA1c officially deviates. At the same time your fat profile shifts: your triglycerides rise, your HDL drops, and your ApoB counts more small particles. Those three often move together, and that is exactly why it is useful to see them in one panel rather than apart. Dig into this via fasting insulin and HOMA-IR and HbA1c in non-diabetics.

Hormones and recovery: the sports side of the panel

For anyone who trains, the hormone side of the panel tells you how well you recover. Your testosterone and SHBG together set how much free testosterone is available for muscle building, your cortisol reflects your stress and recovery balance, and your TSH says something about your thyroid, which drives your whole metabolism. A low testosterone alongside a high cortisol points to a recovery problem that no single draw would reveal. Read on in IGF-1 explained and what poor sleep does to your hormones.

Stores and blood count: the base under your performance

Your iron stores, your vitamin D and your blood count form the quiet base under your performance. A low ferritin can undermine your endurance and recovery even when your hemoglobin is still normal. In strength and endurance athletes this is a common, easily missed cause of persistent fatigue. A broad panel picks up these store markers by default, so you are not only looking once complaints have already started. See also blood values for endurance athletes.

Who is a broad panel sensible for?

A 360 panel is most useful if you want to steer rather than wait, or if you have complaints that do not fit one system. Persistent fatigue, slow recovery after training, or a family history of cardiovascular disease are classic reasons to look broadly. The Dutch public health institute (RIVM) points out that untargeted testing in healthy people also has downsides: an incidental finding can lead to needless worry or follow-up. So test with a question, not out of curiosity alone.

My line: if you have a concrete reason or a clear goal, broad testing is valuable. If you purely want to "know everything", first discuss with your GP what a result would mean for you.

How do you prepare for your draw?

A broad panel is only as reliable as the conditions you draw under. For the sugar and fat values: fasting, so eight to twelve hours without food, gives the best comparability of your glucose, insulin and triglycerides. For your hormones the time of day counts: testosterone in men is highest in the morning, so a morning draw gives the most representative picture. Cortisol has a strong daily rhythm and says the most in the early morning.

On top of that, temporary factors skew your result. A hard session in the days before can raise your muscle-breakdown values and your CRP, and an illness or infection lifts your inflammation markers. So draw in a calm, representative period, not right after your heaviest block or a bad week. That way you measure your real baseline and not an outlier.

Common mistakes with a broad panel

The biggest pitfall is over-interpreting one single value. With forty markers, the odds are high that one statistically falls just outside the reference, without it meaning anything. A second pitfall is confusing the reference value with a target value: the lab shows what is normal for the population, not what is optimal for you. A third is taking no baseline, so you cannot see a trend later.

My advice here: use your first broad panel as a zero measurement, not a final verdict. The value of broad testing sits in the repeat and the trend, not in one exciting result.

How often should you do a broad panel?

For most people who optimise, once or twice a year is enough, unless you are actively working on a value. If you are working on your fat profile or your sugar handling, a repeat after three to four months makes sense, because many markers only move within that window. Stable values do not need needless repeats; it is exactly the markers you are actively trying to shift that deserve more frequent checks.

How do you read a broad panel?

Read by system, not by single value, and watch the trend over time. One snapshot can be skewed by a bad night, a party weekend or a hard session. A repeat measurement after a few months says more than a one-off result. For the metabolic side, dig into measuring metabolic health; for your heart risk into ApoB and the omega-3 index.

How to compose your own panel

You do not have to measure everything at once. Start with your biggest question and build out. For your hormones and recovery, the general hormone panel fits; for your heart risk the lipids blood test; for your organ function the kidney health blood test. To combine freely, compose your own panel through our custom blood test.

My advice: choose coverage over volume. Five systems with one good marker each tell you more than forty values you cannot place. Always discuss a deviation with your GP.

References

1. Hartstichting (Dutch Heart Foundation). Risk factors for cardiovascular disease. Accessed 2026.
2. RIVM (Dutch National Institute for Public Health). Health checks and self-tests: pros and cons of untargeted testing. Accessed 2026.
3. Sniderman AD, Thanassoulis G, Glavinovic T, et al. Apolipoprotein B Particles and Cardiovascular Disease: A Narrative Review. JAMA Cardiology. 2019. PMID: 31642874.

Disclaimer

Every blood test result includes a professional assessment by a BIG-registered doctor. This article gives general information and is not a substitute for medical advice. A blood test is a tool to walk into the conversation with your GP better informed, not a diagnosis in itself. For treatment decisions, discuss your results with your GP.