2024 · Seminars in reproductive medicine · open access
Helping Patients to Predict and Confirm Ovulation with the Use of Combined Urinary Hormonal and Smartphone Technology: A Proof-of-Concept Retrospective Descriptive Case Series
Leiva & Ecochard
The finding, in our words
This retrospective case series found that a protocol combining home-based urinary hormone testing with a smartphone application supported fertility management and family planning without unintended pregnancies. The findings suggest that integrating self-collected urinary data with digital tools offers a viable decentralised approach for ovulation prediction.
A paraphrase to the Library’s standard, never the abstract. The source is one link away and is always the authority.
Daily remote urine hormone monitoring of LH and PdG, together with age and cycle start day, can identify menstrual cycle phase and day with 95% confidence; this supports precise, patient-centric cycle tracking outside clinic settings.
Among 32,595 women trying to conceive using a connected home ovulation test, only 12.4% actually had a 28-day cycle despite 25.3% perceiving they did, and over half had cycles varying by 5 days or more. The findings demonstrate that connected home testing reveals substantial individual variation in cycle length and ovulation timing, which could help women better time intercourse for conception.
Menstrual blood offers a noninvasive, patient-centric matrix for detecting endometriosis, cervical cancer, and hormonal disorders through self-collected samples. Wearable in-pad biosensors enabling real-time monitoring and long-term tracking could transform fertility evaluation and early disease detection, though standardisation and large-scale validation remain critical gaps.
The Mira fertility monitor's LH surge and urine E1-3G levels correlated strongly with the ClearBlue Fertility Monitor's LH surge and low-to-high shift in both postpartum and perimenopause transitions, supporting at-home urine hormone monitoring for fertility tracking.
All five at-home urine ovulation predictor kits demonstrated high accuracy (92–97%) when compared with blood LH levels, though sensitivity varied widely from 38% to 77% with Clinical Guard the lowest. Patient experience was comparable across kits, though Clinical Guard was slightly less favoured for future use.