by Tech start-up Emm has unveiled its eponymous menstrual cup, which inserts like a tampon and features smart technology that tracks your period “without your intervention”.
Emm is a range of period products named after the British start-up founded by a woman.
The set contains a neutral colored menstrual cup made of medical grade silicone with a conical shape not unlike a shuttlecock.
“Most menstrual cup designs claim to be one-size-fits-all,” said Emm founder Jenny Button.
“However, the o-ring seal on a standard menstrual cup is a fixed diameter, which leads to leaks if a user doesn’t fit that cup’s exact dimensions,” she told Dezeen.
“The inspiration for the em The design was inspired by stent technology that conforms and flexes to blood vessel diameters.”
The Emm menstrual cup has built-in biosensors – analyzers that automatically record blood loss, flow rate, and the length of your period and menstrual cycle.
After collecting this data, the biosensors connect to an app that can be downloaded to the user’s phone and presents them with their health information.
The Emm menstrual cup is described as a bio-portable product and requires no manual input from its user. Rather, the mug and app can track a person’s period regularly and accurately “without you having to do anything,” according to the developers.
“We chose the name Emm because we think it’s friendly and personable,” explained Button.
“The letter M also has ties to menstruation, monitoring and management – key themes for the company and our first product,” added the founder, who said Emm is currently the only biowearable period product on the market.
The kit also includes an applicator to insert the menstrual cup like a tampon, as well as a rounded portable charging cup and a UV sterilizer to clean the cup between uses.
Emm said his first menstrual cup can hold as much blood as up to four tampons and provide up to 12 hours of uninterrupted protection.
The company explained that all data collected by the app is anonymized, meaning that any patterns recorded during a user’s menstrual cycle are not shared as personal information.
Rather, the start-up hopes that monitoring a larger pool of reproductive patterns could help gain more insight into women’s health status, as menstrual blood is packed with biomarkers.
“Less than 2.5 percent of publicly funded research is devoted solely to reproductive health, but one in three women will suffer from a reproductive or gynecological health problem,” said Emm, who also found that 84 percent of women felt unheard by medical professionals professionals.
“As a result, we often remain without answers. The world needs new insights into the female body to enable better health outcomes.”
Emm is scheduled to launch later this year and is currently on a waiting list.
The choice of alternative period products has grown in recent years as menstruators increasingly reevaluate their relationship with disposable personal care items.
Other menstrual cups include a product designed specifically for teens, and Looncup — a similar product featured in a Kickstarter campaign claiming to be “the world’s first smart menstrual cup.”
Images are courtesy of Emm.
