Name: Scrolling for Answers? Fertility Trends, Myths, and What Actually Works
Uploaded: 2025-10-22T15:16:06.341Z
Duration: 52 min 20 s
Description: Scrolling for Answers? Fertility Trends, Myths, and What Actually Works

Transcript for "Scrolling for Answers? Fertility Trends, Myths, and What Actually Works": Hello, everyone, and welcome to our Women's Health Summit. I am so excited to kick things off with our very first session, scrolling for answers. So last week, we asked the audience, where do you go when you have medical questions? And we heard a range of answers, most commonly TikTok, Instagram, and even chat GPT. Now as the director of marketing here at Generation Next Fertility, I've seen just about everything that gets shared on social media, from wellness hacks to fertility myths and everything in between. Well, today, we're gonna dig into what's real, what's questionable, and what's just plain misleading when it comes to health information online. I'm thrilled to have an amazing panel of women here with me to help sort facts from fiction and share their unique perspectives. Let's start with some introductions. I'd love for each of you to introduce yourselves and share a little bit about what you do. Abby, do you wanna kick us off? Yeah. Sure. Thank you so much for having me today, Destiny. I am just so pumped, to be a part of this conversation and big fans of GNF. Love you guys. So, but I'm Abby Mercado. I'm cofounder and CEO of Rescripted. So we are a women's health media platform. We reach about 20,000,000 women on a monthly basis and ranked number four on Google to the top 1,000 women's health keywords. So, we love women's health. We are, you know, really excited to be providing women with free, readily available and easily accessible information on their body's health and wellness that is most importantly science backed. I have had quite a women's health journey myself. I'm an IVF mom of three. Building my family did not come easily, but it was, going through infertility that really made me passionate about this space and all the things that we don't yet know on our bodies because fun fact. There was research done on women only in 1993, which was not that long ago. So, anyway, I'm so happy to be here. We are so happy to have you, Abby. Thank you for that amazing introduction, and I'm looking forward to diving in. Viva, please. Yeah. Thank you so much. It's such an honor to be here. I'm so excited to just learn from everybody and also answer questions. My name is Viva Vadlamani. I am the CTO and cofounder of Ladybug, and I'd like to everybody to think of Ladybug as kind of like the support for women's health. So we're a curated, medically advised marketplace for female health products across any life stage, symptom, and concern. And the premise of us is to really cut past that product information misinformation that you could find on TikTok or Instagram and search comfortably for products that actually work that you can use and that's safe for your health in any way you're trying to use it. So, yeah, it's so awesome to just hear from different people who are experts in their own area and be a part of this. So I'm very excited. Fantastic. Thank you so much for joining, and thank you so much for sharing that. So, Abby, I wanna kick it off with you. And, you know, a lot of people have been asking us, how accurate is health advice on Instagram and TikTok? Can you share some insight on how to find the most accurate and safe information? Like, what are the signs that maybe a health post might be misinformed? So, yes, I'm so happy to take that one. I know. No. It's like it's such an easy one. Like, it is, I don't know the actual statistic. I think it would be I mean, it's my dream to, you know, be able to build something where a consumer can, you know, enter something that they saw on social media, and we can say, okay. This is true or this is false. But there is I think bottom line, there is so much misinformation and disinformation on social media. And so, you know, as a consumer as consumers, like, we really need to like, I love this question because we really need to be educating ourselves as to how to spot misinformation and disinformation. So a few things I'll note. So if a post on social media is, like, viral, it's probably fake news. So, like, something that like, the algorithm loves sensationalism. So, you know, if if that post if that real whatever is, like, just, like, so viral, it's because, you know, it like, there might be misinformation attached to it. Also, another thing, post its peak in, like, absolutes. So, like, this will cure your hormones. Like, that is something that you should definitely watch out for. It's probably I mean, it's oversimplified for sure, and it's most likely false. I would say by and large, like, beware of, wellness influencers, beware of, wellness gurus, and I feel like we we hear this all the time. Like, people who say you'll they'll heal your hormones. Like, what does that even mean? Like, I don't know what that means. Right? Like, it's and there's just, like, so much of it. Like, what? Like, that that's just, like, not even a thing. What, like, what is going on? So, definitely, definitely be aware of of that message. I Viva, I love that you're here, and I'm excited to, like, hear from you, hopefully, on on this topic. But, there are tons of direct consumer brands, you know, in the women's health and wellness space, and they're claiming to be science backed. Mhmm. And that's really tough. So, we work with a ton of direct consumer brands at Rescripted, and we really have to dig in to make sure that they are science backed. And the thing about women's health, that I find really interesting, like, as a former VC investor, we are having to like, this is such a new industry that we are using education as a product. So as such, a lot of women's health companies are putting out content, that are kind of like, it's a it's a wrap around to the product or service that they're providing, which is really cool and really important. And, you know, brands that are truly science backed, like, they are, you know, putting out content that is, like, really, really well done. And so the way that you like, let's say you're targeted by a direct consumer brand on social media, and they're educating you, like, the first thing that you should do is head to their blog, and see if their posts are medically or scientifically reviewed, by somebody with credentials. So that's kind of a a fun a fun hack. Like, I always that's kind of, like, my first line of defense. Mhmm. Although, until LinkedIn, seeing if they have medical or scientific professional, that's that's really, really important. And then even better if they've published studies. So studies are expensive and difficult to do if you're, like, an earlier stage startup. But that really, to me, is the proof point that the brand is actually, you know, selling something that is science backed and medically informed, and, therefore, you can listen to, you know, their content. So this is long. I have I've I've got a couple more things to say. Yeah. You're into it. Okay. Okay. Cool. I'm like, you tell me to stop. Like, I could talk about this, like, literally. So if the con if the content is from a media company, I would say trust them a little bit more so if they're a health media company. So, obviously, shameless plug, rescripted. We always put out science backed content. We are a media company. We put our medical and scientific advisers, like, front and center on our site. So, again, like, make sure the personnel that is associated with the company that they're, like, super legit. And, you know, I like, in addition to Rescripted, like, there's so many, health centric media companies that are just, like, doing amazing things. Like, a few in the fertility industry are the RibbonBox and Pregnantish, and then the Skin, Mind Body Green, Healthy Women, and FlowSpace. Those are all companies that are in the media space that are providing some really, really great content. And then gosh. I think the last thing I'll say is if something is a hashtag ad actually, it's not in the last thing. Something is a hashtag ad, like, always just, like, happy with a little bit. And then lastly, I'm so glad that doctor Luke joined because I think that the physicians out there putting out, like, probably the most amazing content. And, you know, I think doctor Luke is one of the the fittest physicians who is, like, you know, really speaking to women and families and not over their heads, which is so, so, so important to see, doctors kind of get in there and say, okay. I'm, like, I'm not I have all these years of school, and I'm not gonna throw all this medical jargon at you. I'm really gonna break it down in a way that you can understand. So I will shut up. That was really long, but I'm super passionate about this topic. So lots of places to find amazing medical information and, like, truly just be aware of social. I I mean, I love it. I don't even know what to say to that other than, like, I guess, you know, session's over. We know we know we know it all now. Right? So, doctor Luke, thank you so much for joining us. Please, I want you to give we just went around, did a little bit of an introduction, and we were talking a little bit how to figure out what's real information and what's not. So, doctor Luke, please share with us a little bit about yourself. First of all, I apologize. A little bit late. Patient care is always number one. Absolutely. So, but thank you for inviting me to such amazing summit. Really, I, also very excited to have, Abby and, Richard joining us today because this is a, really why we wanted this was because we want to empower women and really refine fertility care or women's health care in general. Because today's topic is not just about fertility care. It's just also women's health care, how we can spread the education to the community, to the world, and hopefully, we can do a little bit more of this kind of empowerment session in, in the coming years. So I am doctor Janelle Luke. I'm the cofounder and medical director here at Generation Next Fertility. This is our second summit kind of women's health session. Last year, we had one and, it was very great turnout. And now here, we do our second, summit, and Destiny promised me that we have at least about two summits per year. So, hopefully, we'll have another fall summit, and we're really focusing, fall and spring focusing on, women's health, conscientiousness about their body, their body basically, mind, wisdoms, and body, is what we are trying to really focus in. And how do we spread the education, to the community, so they don't feel alone or helpless because it's information is indeed everywhere, like Abby was trying to say. And they however, how does patient other patient get the reliable information that more applicable to them? That requires education because there are lots of information, chat g p t, Internet, Google. So how do we selectively get the education we need? How the patient filter those information would need some empowerment. So here we are. Awesome. Thank you so much, doctor Luke. Now, I wanna go to Veeva real quick. And I know Ladybug was created to provide some clarity about product recommendations while we're scrolling. Are there red flags that we should look out for while shopping for women's health products online? Yeah. Definitely. So kind of piggybacking off of Abby, I am a TikTok scroller. I love TikTok. I love Instagram. I get so much of my information there, and I feel like it's targeted so well to me. But I don't have a medical degree, and it's so difficult to really discern, like, what to do. And now that I work at Ladybug, it's there's some filters and kind of flags that I can see about red flags that are there and that are available, but it's truly so hard to discern that if you are just a standard consumer, you're looking for something that's addressing a need. There's somebody telling you that something is addressing that and then you're like, oh, I might as well just buy it. A red flag that I would kind of look for if I was just a normal consumer, it is really hard to do it, but truly Amazon is something that is so difficult to navigate when it comes to women health products. There's so many different retailers. There's so many dupes of things. I feel like one example is, like, when I buy my sunscreen from La Roche Posay, I never know if I'm getting it from the actual brand versus something else, like, if it's just a counterfeit. And that's why we have, like, the Sephora for makeup. Like, you buy your eyeliner or your mascara off of there, you know you're getting the real deal. And that's kind of what we wanna do with Ladybug. It's aggregate products that are working directly with suppliers. So while it's hard as a consumer, I think, to really kind of discern that, we as the whole point of Ladybug is that we're a marketplace that does that for you. So if there's a product on there, you know that it's vetted based off criteria for the product category type that it's in. So, for example, like, pelvic dilators. Like, all of them work. All of them are FDA cleared. And if they're not, there's a reason why they're not, and they've done all the studies for that. There's bite sized information on our site and on our product page to really help you kind of understand what that even means because I also don't even like, before this, I didn't know that things had to be FDA cleared versus FDA approved. And Mhmm. I think it's it's very hard, like, truly and candidly. Like, it's hard to discern what those red flags are, but I would try to say, like, if you can find it off of Amazon, that's my like, look on Amazon, see what the choices are out there, and maybe go to your doctor or go to Ladybug or a trusted source that really knows kind of the medical background behind what those products are and whether they will be safe for you to use. So, yeah, that's my short answer. It's very hard. That's kind of all I have as, like, a definitive answer, but, hopefully, we can make it a little bit easier on Ladybug for the products that we have stocked. I know. And not to mention, you guys deliver for free in the city. So if anybody needs a tampon or this or that, it's like, boom. It's right there, which I think is so amazing. Yeah. So great. Yeah. And the goal of us oh, sorry. The goal of us is just to, like, make it equitable and really let people know what their options are so that you can shop safely and kind of, like, you don't you can put you can go a little bit on autopilot and really shop for products that actually work. So yeah. Amazing. Thank you for that. Now, doctor Luke, I wanna go into myths a little bit. Now I feel like a lot of us growing up believe that the moment you had sex, boom, you're getting pregnant. And it was like this thing that you should be nervous about. Now as a as the medical director at a top 10 fertility practice in New York City, can you talk about whether this is fact or fiction? The first of all, you don't know the the this fast. So yes and no to your answer. This is where the complication of, sometimes biology and sciences is yes and no. For certain patients, if you have sex at the right timing so I'm gonna give you some basics of how long the sperm survives in the, cervical canal or, vagina versus, how it survive. So eggs usually survive about twenty four hour in the fallopian tube after it's ovulate. And then the sperm survive about forty eight to seventy two hours. Yes. So some of you are calculating. If you're ovulate tomorrow, you have sex today or tonight, you can still, hypothetically, can get pregnant tomorrow as in the sperm and egg meet meets together or fertilize the egg in that ideological sense. So, if you are a patient, and this is where the age also has a factor because not every egg are good eggs. And I know it's a well, is every sperm and a good sperm also is no. So, for women, eggs are coming into different ratio. And, if you are 22 years old, 23 years old, yes, I always tell patient, each month you ovulate one egg, and, yes, the specific time usually in the in the middle of the month. For patient with PCOS as your regular cycle, it is something that you may require consultation to understand when you ovulate, but majority of women with a regular cycle, they usually ovulate in the middle of the month divided by two. Okay? And plus minus three days. I always use that formula. And most of your, app calculator use this formula. They divide by two plus minus three days. And then if you hypothetically have sex every other day that month, according to that scheduling, you should able to, get pregnant if there is enough sperm and if it is a good egg. So how do you know if it's good or bad egg? And said to the our audience out there, we don't know if it's a good and bad egg. So that's why you're trying. But if you are a younger woman at, in your early twenties, majority of egg in in a year are good. So each month is one egg. In a year is 12 eggs. It's nine good, three bad. Oh. I know, guys. This can't be interesting. That's amazing. Five is half and half. Now I'm using this very simple ratio, and most patients just, love it because they can conceptualize. It's science reduced down to, nine versus three, eight versus four, five and six and six. Not really. But in some ways, that is how, your body functions. And some patients may even have all x in a year, and then some bad eggs, but each month you ovulate. But that is where the age play a big most significant point and in terms of egg quality. Then secondly, sperm. So here we go. Not all sperms are great, but they come in millions. And we only need one sperm to fertilize an egg. And this is a very hard concept for patient. Why then do you need millions of sperm? Because they're meant to die. It's like a soldier is going to a castle. Then I always use, you know, the Greeks back in you know, they run to the castle, but there's only one Troy or one king or one prince. And I'll get to the castle and get the queen. You know? I guess it's a typical more traditional story, but in some ways, it come in droves, the numbers, and, the great sperm is only really about two, three, or four percent of all the entire sperm. Hopefully, we selectively swim up. One of them will, a crowd of them will then go to about 5,000,000 reduced down in the uterus, and then only really 50,000 reaching the tube. And once the 50,000 is around the tube, then one will get to excel. Sorry. I didn't mean to, weave back to your question. Doctor Luke, can women just get pregnant right away? And the answer is, yeah, if the guys have enough sperm and, and the woman is young, it is actually very easy to get pregnant. That's why the younger self of us in college or medical school or high school, hey. Please have birth control because the sperm also survive a, a period of time in the vagina. So it sound very easy. But then as you get older, and this is where patient talk about, I know ladybug here and rescripted, talk about environmental cost or there's any reasoning that's causing why there's so many IVF centers for this center around why women are having trouble getting pregnant. But one of the biggest factor, if you look at CDC data and government data, is that we are dealing our reproductive use. I know any of you have cousins, nieces, or even your friends may don't want to have a baby in their early twenties. Right. And majority of our, women population, they want to, have their freedom of trips, college, medical school, law school, engine you know, whatever, higher education or business or start ups, whatever the reasoning is. So that is where I think the crux of the problem, you know, is. But it is one of the, one of the, I think, determining factor is age. And, yes, environmental factor, there's some data that they play on it. And, I was going to, going to wait for your destiny later, but would would love to ask lady about some questions about the products. But it is very interesting is because, we do see a trend of, like, couples of infertility is one of ten. I see a new status in one of seven, one of eight. So it is happening, in terms of that in terms of why infertility has happened more frequently. Wow. Thank you for that, doctor Luke. And now I do have a follow-up question. What are some ways women can find out more about their fertility? Is it possible to know how many eggs you have left? Yes. You can. There's something called a quantity. So what I just talk of was majority equality. A quantity is a, is more about how many eggs you can, how do you say this? So each of us have thousands of eggs left even when we are menopause. I know. You're like, doesn't make sense. I thought menopause means zero eggs. So the quantity number that we are seeing is how many recruitment of follicles or eggs in that cycle. So as you age, the follicles that is available to recruit it get smaller and smaller, in terms of numbers. So when you're in your twenties, we, I told my patient you have between five to 10 follicles on each ovary. When you're in your thirties, it goes down to three to seven. And then your forties, it goes down to one to five in each ovaries. Okay? And it has a range. Now this is what patients love numbers because we want some diagnostic value. How high is my number? Maybe the high the number, I will get pregnant much faster than her. So here's the sad news. No. Quantity does not equal to quality. So if a 25 year old with a AMH, which is the number, is let's say she only had three eggs on each side, so then AMH may be, like, 1.6, versus a woman who is, 35 years old and her number is three point zero, which is the AMH, and she has more eggs, let's say, 10 on each side. The patient who is at 25 still get pregnant easier than a patient who is 35 because of the, age, because of quality. Again, you don't need that many to get pregnant. But those numbers are important for egg freezing sometimes, because many patients want to freeze as many. I have more chances. Yes and no. Right now, the data, we don't have 10,000 egg freezing women patients come and get their eggs, versus the other 10,000 to do a really good study to verify is that more egg frozen will be better. But right now, preliminary data, the ideology and the logic of reasoning, yes, more eggs may help with egg freezing patients because they have more, but we don't know we still think, actually, not don't know. We still think the HP play much determining factor, like, when you freeze your eggs versus the quantity. So, age, it correlates with quality. Those two variables are very important in the fertility journey of that quantity. Fantastic. Thank you, doctor Luke, for that insight. And, you know, while we're on the subject of the fertility journey, Abby, I wanna pose this question to you because you've been very about your own journey, and you're building community with Rescripted right here, and I wanna get your perspective. What's the best take you've heard on making the fertility journey more manageable? I'm sorry. More manageable. Oh my gosh. There well, I will say, like, there's no there's no, like, real and true way to make that easy. Like, it's just hard. Like, it's it's always going to be hard. So I mentioned I, I am an IVF a mom of of three IVF kids. So my, my big my big kids are six year old twins, and then I've got a 14 old. And they're such a blessing. They're amazing. Definitely, like, worth the weight, worth the heartache, worth the effort. Yeah. Because that's that's what it took. We had male factor infertility. So, we joke about it now, but, my husband's sperm, they like, he's a very social guy and his sperm are like that. Like, they chase his sperm, like, chase each other around and go in a circular motion. So, he has low motility and poor morphology. Not it wasn't such a joke in 2018. It was, like, a very serious diagnosis. And, you know, it was it was all sorts of challenging. And this is kind of my first, like, entree into women's health and why I became so passionate about it because men's health impacts women's health. Right? So, like, I had to do all these things to my body, because my husband's friend didn't work, and we wanted to build our family. I think some things that really were helpful to me, I I had, like, a fertility mentor, an infertility mentor. So, I had a friend who and this is back in 2018. I feel like people are a lot more public about it, which is great. Doctor Lucas, the statistic we've heard is it's actually one in six. It's like you're in fertility. You are not alone. So yeah. And, you know, environmental factors, you know, we're starting to we're having kids later. Like, all the just all sorts of contributors. PCOS is one in ten. Endometriosis is one in ten. So, anyway, this this, this thing is very widespread. So you're not alone. Back in 2018, not a lot of people were talking about it. So it's all particularly lonely, isolating. I didn't feel like I had a lot of information. I didn't feel educated and empowered, blah blah blah. But I didn't have one friend who she was going through it, like, kind of at the same time as me. And so we just became so close. We were each other's person. So, like, for me, community was not large, but a little bit smaller. So I was I was turning to this, like, one person. Mhmm. And that was that was really amazing for me. I would say in retrospect, I wish I had had a fertility focused therapist. This is something that I know is just a lot more widespread in the industry now. There's so many talented, fertility therapists who take insurance. So it can be like, therapy can be expensive, but it is covered, these days. I wasn't way back when. But I think, you know, from what we hear from patients right now, it's, like, somebody who is very, like, niche focused in the IVF experience, because you don't wanna have to explain like, IVF is is a language in and of itself. Right? Like Right. You know, you don't you don't wanna have to explain kind of, like, the basic the logistics, the human body, like, all of the things that you're learning on this crash course. Like, in terms of learning about your body, like, you don't have to reexplain that to somebody who's helping you handle your emotions. And then let's see. What else would I have to say? You know, your clinic, like, obviously, you know, has ways that they they can support you. Lots of clinic have support groups and whatnot. Nurses are, like, amazing in terms of just, like, breaking down something and, you know, getting that extra support and saying, hey. Like, you know, nurse whomever, nurse Jane, like, I don't understand this. This is really overwhelming to me. Like, help me understand how to, you know, get myself a shot of Medicare. Like, that's that's challenging. It's like a whole different mental load. And then the last thing I'll say, the two week wait is, like, the worst thing ever. And I I actually don't remember like, I I feel like my regret during the two week wait. I wish I had just, like, shut my brain off. And one of the most, like, beautiful things that I've heard of, like, someone kind of handling the two week wait with strength and resilience and perseverance was she had just this big beautiful mural. And during the two week wait, she colored it at night. So after work, she'd come home, and she'd just turn her brain off, and she just colored this mural. And sure enough, IVF was successful, and she ended up hanging in the nursery. So I hope that's I love that. That's just sweet, sweet thing, to make just going through a difficult fertility process that much easier. So, so, yeah, those are my tips and tricks as an IVF mom. I love that. And I think that's such relatable what you're saying about, you know, you gotta turn your brain off a little bit maybe for the two week wait. You have to have the support system. I mean, we have candid conversations. We meet once a month, at the beginning of the month on Thursdays over Zoom and to see how many women are coming in and saying, oh my gosh. This group is so helpful. I feel so much better. I'm finding community. I'm even talking to other people who are cycling, and we're talking about, hey. What's the how do we find the best place to put our PIO shot in? And what are you doing to kind of destress or provide yourself with self care? Is it acupuncture? Is it just getting a massage? So, you know, some of those, groups are really important and impactful, and, thank you so much for kind of sharing a little bit about that. Mhmm. I'm sure the audience really appreciates it. Now I I want to go into a little bit of a lot, but, doctor Luke, I wanna touch on the menstrual cycle real quick. Now you did a great video on tampons after that lead expose. Can you share a little bit about that topic for those who may have missed it? Oh, I think you're on mute. Okay. Yes. Sorry. I didn't want to disturb and have you stopping. Yes. I did a I'm very interested in vaginitis and, menstrual cycle and the products that we use during our menstruation. And one of the video idea I think it was a year ago now, Destiny, and it was on, toxic shock syndrome. And I think, well, there are a couple of things. One is toxic shock, and one is there was some product having, chemicals in the where they were producing some metals that was inside, and they were just test, testing it randomly. I think it was a newspaper journal article just like, okay. And then it was a what? Oh, it's almost like aluminum metals in it, like, all these toxic, compounds. And it was a interesting kind of a regulation because where they produce, what is the process in this, pads and 10 pound products. And I I know, we have a, ladybug here, so I I do want to hear, some of her insight in terms of, what makes what the products available out there. Is it really different or is it gimmick? I'm very into gimmicks. Like, I I I I you know, we we because sometimes it sounds very natural, and I and I'm from a east western culture. And I always tell patient, well, if it has an effect in your body such as, an herb, it's a Chinese herb, and you you you say it's natural. Yeah. But it did have an effect. So that means it's a chemical and it's a medication. So same as, medication, that we take. Some of them actually is from a plant. Tacrolimus is a anti, I say, steroid is from a compound for a plant in Japan. That's how tacrolimus is is one just I'm sorry. Just one steroid we use, and we're just talking about it, how, plant, chemicals is eventually like estrogen. That's also a plant. Like, there's some estrogen. I I'm very fascinated in how products like this are being regulated in the market, so I would like the audience to know. And, secondly, is how does, different companies in the market are producing, different versions of it. And what is really natural as a gimmick is something. Yeah. Been hard. I would love to hear. Yes. Yeah. I was just gonna say, Viva, this is exactly why I think you're it's so amazing that you're here today because, like, as we're talking about these period products, what are you recommending women look into as an alternative to these toxic tampons? Totally. That is such a great question. And as somebody who uses tampons who's not for, like, ten years now, I'm like, the whole lead article was incredibly jarring, and I was just like like, yes. The tampon's only in you for, like, four hours, eight hours max, but it's still, like, going into your blood. Like, it's close to areas if you ever wanna reproduce, like, are there long term effects related to that? And Right. It's so difficult to doctor Luke's point. Organic tampons versus nonorganic, that's just how the cotton composition makes up the tampon itself. It's not really a determiner of whether it's a good tampon versus, like, a non toxic tampon. And it's so difficult to really tell, but, I think the key, like, what you should look for in ingredients, which is still not the greatest tell, is, like, if is this an FDA cleared device? Like, tampons have to be FDA cleared in The United States, but not abroad. So it's like if you're getting tampons from abroad, like, what does that really mean? But if they enter US market, they have to be FDA cleared. Phthalates or heavy metals, there's, like, a whole list of ingredients that and if they're fragranced, absolutely not. Like, do not put fragrance near your vulva, your vagina, anything. That can cause irritation for all parts of everything down there, and it's, like, not safe for you. You don't need to smell a certain way. That's, like, a clear indicator that it's not a product you should be using. But our whole goal at Ladybug is, like, we've tried so hard to look at small brands that's not like Tampax or always, and no shade to anybody using those. They're the most readily available. And, we want to kind of give options that go through rigorous testing of clinical trials. There's, like, additive or additives in terms of, like, lubricant to help you put it in easier. There's so many cool products out there and we're hoping just kind of grow that selection from both an international audience and a US market for products that are safe. So I would say just check out our tampons or pads section. Those are products that are safe, vetted. Our medical advisory board really likes them and set like, kind of deems them as safe. Their ingredients are all natural. Like, there's nothing that's gonna ruin your life or has, like, toxic metals or leads in it. But, again, it's so tricky. It's like somebody who doesn't have a medical background or, like, even people who do, it's like, how do you really tell what's, like, the long term effects of these things? So hopefully, we can kind of just adapt as more products come out and really learn. And as, like, more studies are done on women and just, like, the effects of all of this and tampons to your menstrual hormonal health and everything, like, we can just kind of bring in more products, release products, and, like, keep that selection as curated as possible. I love that. I I just want to differentiate one thing. I want to talk about toxic absorption syndrome. It is a, toxins, that is a grow so when the tampons left so it is actually two different things. One is about, hygiene care. One is about what is the makeup of the tampons. So I don't want to blame tampons. That one I know at one point, I was, oh my god. Tampons are toxic. They within, it would causes me to be toxic. Shock syndrome. That's not how it works, actually. It's just that the tampons left inside the vagina for a long time, and then there's a virus called I'm sorry. Bacteria caused staph aureus, and then as a staphylococcus aureus producing a toxins that release in back into body in the bloodstream and then causes a toxic shock syndrome. It only happened one to a hundred thousand, so I don't want the audience to be like, oh, I'm not using tampons because, you know, they talk about how bad tampons that's not true. Tefons is actually very safe. Mhmm. It is, but it it is fascinating, as we talk about environmental, how the world regulate it, tampons, where we are in terms of thinking about our lifestyle and, resources we use because, tampons are usually, I think it's from cotton. It is a they don't have too many metals, but it was interesting is that, does the metal causing any irritations or unnecessary? What is a organic tampon? And, and and they will talk about, the corn bleaching and how, some patients worry about the odor from the menstruation. And and I think, Bernard says something very good. It's like, hey. Don't have any fragrance because we do have patients when they have fragrance that can cause us irritation to the skin. Right. But that is a whole separate kind of regulation, I guess. The, the the or the or or or or the health organization in terms of the products that comes into play. But I don't know if the metals will have a significant impact. That's all. Mhmm. Well, you know, I feel like while this talk on misinformation and infertility and toxic products, it feels like it's hard to navigate, you know, through all these viral posts as we've been talking about this morning. Abby, I'd love to know what advice you have for those who might be doomscrolling health content. Like, what can we do to empower ourselves? Don't doom scroll. That's probably my yeah. That's probably my, like, the biggest advice. Yeah. Don't doom scroll. Just, you know, to share, like, a little personal story. I, I was going through I was pregnant with my, third my third my second pregnancy, and I was diagnosed with perinatal depression. And I saw a therapist that was trained in that that space, and the first thing she told me was to get off social media. And that was, something that, like, you know, we've we've reached a lot of women via social. It's, like, one of our, like, a a core part of our, like, strategy of of reaching women with with science backed health information. So it was a little bit off the beaten path for me to get off social media, but I did. And it was just really, you know, a game changer for me, for my mental health. I feel like I was just getting a lot of information that was conflicting. And so, you know, I think, like, you know, going back to my my ten minute monologue earlier about, you know, trying to find information that like, trying to understand what is misinformation and disinformation. You know, instead of doomscrolling, like, some things that I really love, you know, I love specifically going to check out, like, my favorite creator's content Yeah. Instead of doom scrolling. So having your favorite social creators kind of, you know, earmarked. And, you know, anytime you have a question, like, go browse their content and see if they have an answer. I love newsletters. There's so many newsletters create new newsletter creators out there that are, you know, writing in a little bit more detail, about certain health concerns. And, you know, I love I love the Internet of old where, like, you're going directly to a website. Mhmm. You know, you pick a category that is interesting or pertinent to you, and, you're kind of diving into that category versus versus doomscrolling, in a way that might not be applicable to you and might also be fake news and might be, negatively impacting your mental health. So that's what I would say is the the antidote, to doom scrolling. I love that, and I love earmarking your favorite influencers or content creators because I think that's great. It's like I'm not gonna get off social media completely, but I do have people who I love to follow and I love their content, and I feel like that can give me a little break in in a way in itself. Now I do wanna make some time for, q and a because I know the audience has submitted some questions. So I think we should just dive right into them. Yeah? Alright. Let's go. Let's hear from the audience. Okay. If I struggle with yeast infections or UTIs, could it be related to using tampons? Doctor Luke, do you wanna take that one? Yes. I think this is great. I I let's talk about vaginal health. See, I have my little uterus here, so I just have my ear to explain each the organ itself. So, I will go through dissect. I'm I'm sorry. I'm going to if I can take a minute to, first of all, talk about, how vagina regulate, the environment and how what tampons are. Okay? Because I I think we alluded to it, but not really talk about the actual details and nitty gritty of it. So here we go. This may be a good material for future also. The vagina actually is a bunch of bacteria in there, and I'm sometimes not very clear. And some patients are like, what's bacteria? I said, lots of bugs. You know? They're like, what does but it seems that our GI tract, same as anywhere. It's a bunch of, it's a lot of bacterial, growth, and and they're balancing itself. And you will hear a bunch of, like, majority. So I'm not going to give you guys lots of names if you want to. I know. I I we just talked about don't Google and don't go crazy. But, actually, if you ask very specific question to chat GBT or Google, like, a specific question, not like, what can cause vaginitis? Sometimes it can be misleading, but you're like, what kind of bacteria that doctor Luke is talking about? It is on the Internet. Okay? But let's say, there are a lot of flora that's in there. And to equate this, it's like our mouth. Let's say, I'm not gonna fight Destiny, but if I fight Destiny, I have flora in my mouth, and it can penetrate through the skin and it can cause infection. You're like, wait. But the floor is my mouth. How come it doesn't, create any issue? Because they you have a mucus layer that separate your the bacteria that regulates the mouth. And why do you need bacteria in your mouth? Because you're eating foreign, food. Vagina, what's going on? Well, there are lots of foreign material to vagina such as sperm, tampons, and many things. It's actually on the outside. So then vagina exposed to the outside world, actually, and that's how also you give birth, right, when the baby comes up. So lots of people have theory about, when the baby comes out, you gain immunity because it's going through the vagina. There's some lots of theory about, some bacteria called uroplasma to inhibit from fertility. So there's some theories out there, but the main point of facts so see, that's like the gray. I always call that the gray medicine. Everyone has different opinion. If you go, if you look for PubMed and look at the articles, there's no definitive answer. But the black and white is that, vagina has to keep at a certain, pH value. It's a little bit lower than alkaline value, like 7.2. Again, no need to understand the number, specifically, but, basically, the bacteria is creating a pH value in the vagina when there is stress. Let's say you use a a fragrance step on, and you're changing, some of the environment inside the vagina. Okay? And that is when patients Mhmm. May be likely to have yeast infection because now one bacteria win the other bacteria, causing you lower up, bacterial growth on certain bacteria where the pH value went up. So now you can what that means, the pH is acidic is to kill germs. When the pH value go up, it means then the bacteria can grow there. The bacteria that you don't want, and that's when they cause this yeast infection, bacteroid effigillous, like, many of the infection that, survive and thrive in non acidic environment. And so those are the bacteria that will cause the symptoms. And for tampons, just want to be very clear about its own testing requirements. It does go through, the absorbency testing, which is, standardized to see any, prevent misleading claims. Do you remember those, commercial? They say you can absorb forever one pad for three nights for heavy bleeding. So they want, so there's a agency that actually regulate that. They do go for microbiological testing. So staff, caucus stethoscoccus aureus that we've talked about, they do test it before, according to regulation agency, before it's produced in the market. The chemical residual testing, which is the metal testing that we just talked about, lead or any heavy metals, any pesticides. There's you know, they do go through that before they is available in the market. I think that article was just revealing, oh my god, what's the threshold of the testing, and what can cause really, detrimental effect to the patient. And then finally is file compatibility. Any allergic response is vaginal irritation, irritation. So if you do a bunch of testing, before it is launched in the market. Then, one of the thing with tampons is that, no, tampons should not affect the vaginal flora, and that is why those testing is to prevent any product that will somehow cause a certain, certain reaction in the vagina that can increase the risk of infection. However, as you know, a product that is produced is ninety eight percent to the public. It's okay for ninety eight percent of the population. We may still miss one, two, three percent. So patients who are very allergic or have a loss of sensitivity, so in soap, so in underwear, so in pets, has to be very cautious when you guys are reading the labels. And, yes, this is where the organic and this is where the key mix start to come in the organic pads, and they claim themselves to be all cotton, to be, may not have certain rayon or, you know, natural cotton, but does not mean it doesn't have a toxic shock syndrome. So just be aware what you are taking, but certain patients may be, I don't know, have a I mean, very hard to be allergic to rayon. I I'm not a cotton, expert, or different fabric expert, or material experts. But, but if you're allergic to certain material, this is very important, to understand. And then, yes, we advise changes of tampons of pest every four to eight hours to treat the hygiene, well. And so, and one more thing, organic claims on tampons are not regulated by FDA. That's another thing that we should also understand. Awesome. Thank you. I think we have a couple more questions. Oh, sorry. I I was a little bit late. Oh, what do you think about EVA cups if they work? Should I wear with pads or period panties just in case? Oh, that's a good one. Diva? I can yeah. I can take that one. Yeah. Take it. I love Diva Cups. I went backpacking a couple years ago, and I conveniently got my period on the first day of the three day trip. And I was like, I can't change my tampon, like, every couple of hours because TMI, I'm a heavy bleeder on the first couple of days. So Yeah. I tried my hand at the Diva Cup or just like any menstrual cup in general. I use the June cup specifically, but, there's so many different different options for it. There's also the option of menstrual discs versus cups and I think they're really nice simply because you can keep them in for a little bit longer. I think the range recommends from either eight hours or twelve hours depending on the country that you buy or the product was manufactured in. And they've never they've never leaked with one, which is crazy. I feel like they hold so much more just because they're not absorbing. They're Mhmm. Gathering menstrual blood. So it holds more than a tampon or a pad normally without feeling kind of like, oh, I need to change it now. Also, I guess in terms of like the environmental factor, there it's nice to just have I guess, the issue is that there's a little bit of a learning curve of both a disc and a cup, but there's so many cool options out there and whether you have a high cervix or a low cervix or you've given birth or you haven't given birth and there's so many options and the shapes for whatever works best for you and, yeah, I mean, I really like them. I think just the learning curve aspect of it is a little difficult, but we have a product guide on Ladybug that helps you kind of sort through which one to use and how to insert, how to remove. So it's a little less scary than just like, oh my gosh, what do I do with this? So definitely check them out. I think they're a great option if tampons and pads are not your thing or you wanna try something different. Amazing. Thank you so much for that recommendation because I think a lot of people have are so curious about the Diva Cup right now or period panties. So I think that gave us a really good insight. Now I can't believe it, but it's actually happening. We have about three minutes left in this session. So, I wanted to say what an amazing discussion this was. I wanna thank you all so much for being here and sharing those amazing insights. It really was wonderful to hear from everyone today, and we really appreciate you taking the time. I know so many of us were looking forward to this conversation. So if you'd like to continue the discussion, please be sure to check out our doc section for more ways to connect with our speakers. And next up, we have freeze today planned tomorrow where we'll be talking how truly to own your fertility timeline. So I will see you there, and thank you so much for joining us. Thank you for having us. Thank you for having us. This is awesome. Awesome. Bye, everyone.