Every woman on this planet will know what we mean with this. That time of the month…where your mood changes to turn you into a mini hulk and the minute after can put you into tears. Hormones rising up and messing with your body and finally it. Your period is here, again, as every other month. Now start the worries.
You want to wear those awesome white shorts that you like that much but….somehow you don’t feel comfortable doing it because you know “accidents” can happen if you what we mean…But no worries! If you are always wondering whether is it time to change your tampon for a new one or not, company My.Flow developed a tampon monitor, which alerts the user as to the saturation level of her tampon via a notification on her phone. It takes the physical form of a small clip that the user can discreetly attach to her belt or undergarments, and feed her tampon string into. The tampon does not contain any circuitry or batteries; it merely has conductive thread running through its center through its string, connecting to the circuitry that is contained on the belt clip. So stop wondering and asking your friends around if you have some stains.
But it is not only about the “accidents” we have to worry about, it is also the painful cramps some woman suffer, you feel me right? What can we do to fight that? Painkillers? We would rather not. Most of the times it helps a hot water bottle, a package of chips and snuggle in bed, but this is not enough. Livia is a new pain management device. It tunes into the wavelength frequency of your menstrual pain and blocks the pain from registering in your body. Livia aims to put an end to the painful cramps with its drug-free solution for menstrual pain. Livia’s technology is based on the “Gate Control Theory”. It transmits a pulse that is keeping the nerves “busy”. Busy nerves means that the nerve-gate is closed, therefore pain signals cannot pass through and are unfelt, Yeiii!
So no pain, no stains, now what else? Well, if you are not a tampon girl, there is also something smart for you out there. LoonCup is a smart menstrual cup that tells you exactly how full it is, and when it’s time to refresh, it has an embedded sensor that speaks directly to your smartphone. The LOONCUP will precisely track your fluid volume, fluid color, and analyze your cycles (or at least that’s what they promised when they launched on Kickstarter since the product is not out there yet…)
Besides these products, is there something we could do to take advantage of having our periods every month? They will be there anyway so maybe we can use that insane amount of blood we loose to track our health as well? That was the first thought of The NextGen Jane a company that patented a method for capturing menstrual flow and transformed it into medical samples. Menstrual flow contains more than just blood; it is also rich with cells shed by the ovaries and uterus. Those cells, paired with genomics tools, might open up a window on women’s bodies and give early warning of cancer and reproductive diseases. They used 3D-printed prototypes that extracts liquid from a tampon. The method holds great promise for the home-diagnostics industry; it is simple enough for a woman to use in her own bathroom. We will need to wait a bit longer to see it in the market as they are still working on it.
Carinwear is another product from Dutch company Lifesense-Group. Although it is aimed to help women to train their pelvic floor muscles and to have a better bladder control we also see a lot of potential in identifying those non-expected leaks! Carinwear is a rechargeable sensor that is placed on their special pocket of the protective underwear that comes also with it. Snap the sensor on the protective underwear and wear it during the first three days of each cycle. One cycle is two weeks and by repeating this in each cycle, it gives you insights about progress. So this is in fact 2×1, exercise your pelvic floor muscles (which is always good) with their app and wear the protective underwear for any kind of leakages! Support them now on Kickstarter and help them get funded! But not only that! You can see them life at the WT | Wearable Technologies Conference in San Francisco on July 12-13 since they will be exhibiting! Who knows maybe we can go back home with a new pair of underwear…
We see the light at the end of tunnel with all these new products that aim to make our periods less painful and more “enjoyable”! Goodbye little hulk!
