There are many mobile applications already on the market that allow women to track their menstrual cycles, either for simple regulation, monitoring purposes, or there are those aimed toward women who are specifically trying to get pregnant.
There aren’t many designed for pregnancy prevention.
Cycle Technologies has been focused on women’s reproductive health since it was founded by Leslie Heyer in 2002. The company’s newest free iOS app, DOT, which is out today via iTunes, uses Dynamic Optimal Timing technology. It does what the others on the market do as well, but what makes it stand out is that it’s also designed for those who don’t want to get pregnant. They might not be using contraceptive methods for various reasons but still want to be proactive about monitoring that risk.
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When a woman uses DOT, she can specify from the beginning what her goals are. Based on self-reported data, notifications become available that indicate when conception rates are high, medium or low.
For someone looking to get pregnant, the notifications have a more positive connotation when probability is high, both in message and color scheme. For someone who is trying to avoid conception, the message is framed more as a warning (will show up with a red background).
Throughout each month, DOT’s algorithm looks at things like menstruation cycle length and cycle consistency to determine the ovulation timeline for each individual and determines specific percentages for each day of the month.
The app starts predicting risk after just the first cycle, but the algorithm’s risk percentages will be more conservative in the beginning and indicate risk levels differently depending on the woman’s goals. For someone avoiding pregnancy, any day that’s not low risk is considered high, and for those looking to get pregnant, they want to know even when it’s a medium day. As the data begins to add up month-to-month, it can predict with much more accuracy for both categories of women.
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Heyer said that based on computer modeling, the method appears to be 97 percent to 99 percent effective. A research paper based on this data is currently pending publication.
A woman can access the app whenever they’d like on their phone to see what that day’s percentage is, but optional notifications are available to let a women know when their conception probability shifts from the different risk levels.
Even for some women who wouldn’t consider themselves to have what might be considered an average cycle in terms of length of time, the app is still a useful and accurate tool, according to Heyer.
“It’s designed for women with cycles between 20 and 40 days long,” she said. “It’s a pretty wide range of women. Almost all women, and certainly all women who are potentially fertile, would fall into that range.”
Cycle technologies’ business model is based on optional app upgrades that users will be able to purchase for additional features, as well profits from the company’s product CycleBeads.
Because so many people have smartphones worldwide, this is another example of a simple way women can be proactive about their reproductive health.
DOT is officially available now for iOS and will reportedly be available for Android in the very near future.
