Fertility research is missing something, so tech companies are rushing in to fill the gap. But they haven’t been tested well enough for doctors to believe them.
Apple is very careful with how it talks about the Apple Watch Series 8’s new and improved fertility and cycle tracking features. In the product announcement, the company said that it could “help you plan your family” if you are trying to get pregnant. It can tell you when you ovulated, but only after the fact.
The company isn’t saying that the features can stop people from getting pregnant because that would need approval from the Food and Drug Administration. Rebecca Simmons, a researcher and fertility awareness specialist at the University of Utah, says that people don’t always use cycle tracking technology the way companies say they should.
Because of this, experts like Simmons say that Apple’s features for tracking your cycle are a chance lost for the company to make a more powerful fertility tracking tool. More and more people are interested in birth control that doesn’t use hormones and ways to track their fertility. But medical research hasn’t put in as much money as it should have, leaving a gap that technology companies are trying to fill. But experts in fertility tracking and reproductive health say that some of these efforts don’t have enough rigour to meet the needs of the moment.
It’s great that a company like this is saying “yes, we agree this is important and valuable, and we know people want this information.” “But this isn’t enough reading and writing skills for people to use in a safe way.”
Scientific practices According to Apple’s website, the cycle tracking feature can tell when a user might get their period based on how long their cycles have been in the past. Then, it takes 13 days from when the user thinks their next cycle will start to find their fertile window, which the feature says lasts for six days. The predictions can be changed if a user adds a positive ovulation test result. Users of the Apple Watch Series 8 or Apple Watch Ultra can add ovulation data, which is calculated by the temperature sensors in the watches. Users can also get notified if the app finds a “cycle deviation,” but this feature isn’t available to people whose cycles are affected by things like hormonal birth control.
In Apple’s “Instructions for Use,” it says that 260 users tested the period prediction and 226 users tested the ovulation estimate. The document says that the features met “pre-specified clinical endpoints.” Zaina Khachadourian, an Apple spokesperson, told The Verge to follow these instructions. She did not say if the company has any plans to release information about the features.
Simmons says that way of figuring out when a person might be fertile doesn’t follow best practices for tracking fertility. Simmons helped come up with the method that the app Clue uses for its birth control which has been approved by the Food and Drug Administration.
For one, the length of a fertile window varies so much that most methods would give a longer stretch. Simmons says that taking 13 days away from the first day of a cycle doesn’t give enough information to find a fertile window.
“They are related to fertility, but they do not adhere to all of these distinct physiological criteria.” “People are obtaining this information, but it is probably incomplete at best chances of getting pregnant.
Suzanne Bell, an assistant professor at Johns Hopkins University who studies contraception and reproductive health, says that because Apple is so popular and has a good reputation for being reliable, people might think its products are safer than they really are. She says this could be a problem with apps that track cycles and fertility in general. “There are a lot of ways that the validity or accuracy of the information these apps give can be misunderstood or overinterpreted.”
Apple does put warnings and instructions in the Health app about how people shouldn’t use fertile windows as a way to prevent pregnancy, but users have to go through a few screens to find them.
People do use apps and products that track their cycles to avoid getting pregnant, even though that’s not what they were made for. In a small study of apps that track fertility, 4% of people said they used the apps to avoid having children. It is not clear how common this is, but doctors hear about it from time to time.
People do use apps and products that track their cycles to avoid getting pregnant.
Rachel Urrutia, an expert on fertility awareness and reproductive epidemiologist at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, says that more than a few patients have told her that’s how they’re using them.
Natural Cycles and Clue, two tech companies, have made and tested apps that are meant to be used as birth control. Both groups did studies that showed that if the products were used correctly, they could help prevent pregnancy. In 2018, the FDA approved Natural Cycles as a birth control method, which was a controversial decision. In 2021, the FDA approved Clue as a birth control method.
However, Urrutia claims that neither of these two birth control apps is perfect, and that she has previously criticized aspects of both.(She has no official relationship with either of them.) But she likes that they are open about how they do things and have tested their products and put the results online.
On the other hand, Apple hasn’t given out much information about its fertile window and period prediction feature.
So, technically speaking, they don’t have the same level of responsibility, “says Simmons. But, she says, if they’re going to make predictions based on user data instead of just collecting it, they should take on some of that responsibility. She doesn’t think companies should tell users when they’re most likely to get pregnant unless they’ve tested their method and are following best practices for fertility awareness.
An opening in the market
Tech companies like Apple add features to their products that people want, and they have found that people want to know more about fertility. In the past, the medical community hasn’t paid as much attention to this area as it should.
There hasn’t been a lot of money spent on fertility research.
Fertility awareness hasn’t gotten a lot of research funding, even though it can be a good way to avoid getting pregnant if used right. Doctors can’t help people as much if they want to keep track of their own fertility. Simmons says, “They haven’t been fun to study, and they haven’t been fun to fund, because they’re really boring and require a lot of work.”
Lack of investment in the medical side has left a gap in knowledge that big tech companies with health and wellness goals have been all too eager to fill. So, they can quickly put out features that promise to make it easy to track fertility. But they don’t share the research on which the features are based, they don’t publish their data, and they don’t let people from outside the company look at their programmes.
Tech companies have the money and data to invest in research that could help people learn more about how well fertility awareness works for birth control and getting pregnant. This kind of work could also help a field that hasn’t been given enough credit.
Bell says, “I would love it if Apple used their resources to really test this kind of feature.” Then, people could be more sure, or have more information, about whether to use a product like a smartwatch to help them avoid pregnancy or to try to get pregnant.
If the tools work, it could be a way to help people who want to learn more about their bodies. It’s great that big companies like Apple are speaking out about these problems. But, says Bell, there is a lot at stake.
She says, “Overall, I think it could be good that tech companies are interested in this area and trying to meet this need.” “I just hope they do it with the care and attention to detail that it deserves, because people’s fertility and lives could be greatly affected by their use of these apps.”
