Sex sells: app found to be ‘as effective’ as contraceptive pill

Natural Cycles is a fertility app which has reportedly been shown in recent clinical studies to be as effective as the contraceptive pill at preventing pregnancies.

Results of the clinical study demonstrating the effectiveness of Natural Cycles as a natural birth control have recently been published in the peer-reviewed European Journal of Contraception & Reproductive Health Care.

Now, Natural Cycles has become the first health app for women to be regulated as a medical device.

As more health apps come close to performing tasks that fall under the definition of a medical device there are greater calls for them to be regulated as such.

“Regulation is a good thing in the app and healthcare technology space”, said Dr Raoul Scherwitzl, co-founder and chief executive of Natural Cycles.

“Natural Cycles is backed up by well-researched, large-scale clinical studies and, being CE-marked and ISO certified, means that the quality of our product and the safety of our users is at the heart of every decision we make.

“We know we are dealing with women’s lives here and we take that very seriously.”

Launched in 2014 and headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden, Natural Cycles has over 100,000 active users in 161 countries.

The company recently raised $6m funding to aid international expansion and conduct new clinical studies, and donated $25m worth of free subscriptions to women in Brazil to help fight the Zika virus.

Natural Cycles started the process to get the app regulated as a medical device when it launched in 2014. 

“We made user safety our number one priority,” said Scherwitzl.

“But it took a while for us to be regulated as software apps are designed and developed very differently from hardware devices, which means that sometimes it’s very difficult to adapt to the regulations.”