Welltwigs is a novel hardware solution and mobile app that helps woman conceive by pinpointing the optimum window of fertility within her cycle.

Launched during the Startup Battlefield stage at Disrupt NY, the company offers a pair of devices called Thermotwig and Labtwig, to give women a better way to track their baby-making window. The former is a basal body temperature (BBT) thermometer, while the latter helps check for certain hormones present before and during pregnancy.

Welltwig’s app relies on a unique algorithm, developed under the guidance of the head of reproductive endocrinology at the Mayo Clinic.The data from these sensors are transferred to the smartphone where Welltwig’s app relies on a unique algorithm, developed under the guidance of the head of reproductive endocrinology at the Mayo Clinic. The app then pinpoints the most fertile days to conceive and has the ability to run a pregnancy test.

We’ve seen a number of BBT tracking solutions before, including Ovatemp’s ONDO, BLOOM, Kindara Wink and Daysy. Welltwigs’ co-founder and CEO Murtaza Lakdawala, however, says that BBT can only show peak fertile time after ovulation. “Meaning when BBT detects ovulation it’s already past your peak time to conceive,” he said. “So this month’s data is of no use to conceive this month but can only be used next month.”

Also, for BBT to work, a woman has to have a fairly regular cycle to determine the days of peak fertility in her cycle. Yet the American Society for Reproductive Medicine says about a quarter of women have irregular cycles, putting a bit of a limit on tracking fertility using BBT.

With that in mind, Welltwigs is described as a more comprehensive solution because it uses BBT, hormone tracking and an app to analyze the data and figure out the timing. It is this combination that Lakdawala believes is necessary for scientific accuracy.

[Via: TechCrunch]