Fertility Awareness and Birth Control

The Woman's Cycle in Relation to Conception

On average a woman is only fertile for one day a cycle. That's to say the egg which was released at ovulation is fertilisable for about a day. Since sperm can live inside of a woman for upto 5 days after intercourse, intercourse in the 5 days could lead to fertilisation of the egg upto 5 days later. Although fertility is a one day affair, the whole range of days when intercourse could lead to fertilisation is refered to as the Fertility Window.

Fertility Awareness Method (FAM) of Contraception

In order not to become pregnant in this relatively short period of time, many women day in and day out put a heavy strain on their health or on their sex life with contraceptive measures. We believe that abusing your body with harmful contaminating hormones all the way through your cycle just to avoid a 1 week Fertility Window is not always the best option.

The length of the monthly cycle varies from woman to woman, Cyclotest, Bioself, Pearly and Lady-Compall recognise your personal cycle by registering your Basal Body Temperature (BBT) every morning. A subtle change in this BBT is synonymous with ovulation so by charting the day of ovulation and the length of your cycle the devices can begin to form a model of when you would be fertile in coming cycles. The graphic below summarises a typical BBT profile over a cycle.

Fertility Awareness is about using the knowledge of your body to manage fertility decisions. If you wish to avoid pregnancy you need to know the 'safe days' and then make a decision as to whether to abstain or use reversible contraception on the 'risk days'. If you wish to conceive, these 'risk days' would become your 'optimum days'. Since the use of your knowledge and awareness works both ways ytou can switch from contraception to conception without having to put up with the hormonal come-down and the health risks to you and your unborn baby which this can present.

Aswell as the BBT, hormonal changes can be observed too. The hormone, LH, increases when ovulation is imminent. If you can detect it you know you're about to ovulate. Simple. Urine tests are the most common way to detect it in a domestic environment, these are cheap and easily bought in any pharmacy.

The secretion and discharge of sticky cervical mucus is also related to ovulation. Observation of this is also a valid way to monitor your cycle and forms part of the Fertility Awareness Method (FAM).

Of the contraceptive monitors currently availible in Europe, Cyclotest is the only one which accepts users inputting observational data such as LH increases or cervical mucus. This data confirms more precicley the moment of ovulation, enhancing the already accurate results. It's completely optional as the software and thermometer leave the device fully equipped to be a 'normal' contraceptive computer independantly of the extra data. Using these observations and the BBT system combined means Cyclotest is referred to as a Sypto-Thermal contraceptive device. The graphic below shows the relationship between LH detection and the BBT profile in a typical cycle.

The Medical Basics Reviewed

• Every woman has only one ovulation per cycle. If in rare cases two or several ovulations occur, they occur within 24 hours.
• After ovulation the egg cell is fertilisable for an average of 18 hours after which it dies.
• After having sexual intercourse the sperms are mobile and fertilisable in the woman's body for a maximum of 120 hours.
• Identifying ovulation is the key and then predicting ovulation to show the Fertility Window is the goal.