McMaster research targets menstrual cup ‘mess’ with absorbent tablets to tackle period stigma

About a quarter of the world's population menstruates, but there is little innovation in menstrual products, according to researcher McMaster.

“This field is ripe for innovation. There is so much that can be done. But there are very, very basic needs that are not being met,” said McMaster University professor Zeinab Hosseinidoust.

Hosseinidust is a member of the Department of Chemical Engineering at Hamilton University.

She worked with Associate Professor Tohid Didar to develop smart tablets that work with menstrual cups to make them more accessible and reduce the “mess” that can come with them.

According to UN Women, a UN agency tasked with working towards gender equality and women's empowerment.More than two billion people in the world experience menstruation. In Canada, one in six people who menstruate experience period poverty, with the average person spending about $6,000 on period products over their lifetime, and one in four Canadians “agree that periods are dirty and unclean,” according to federal government research.

In recent years, menstrual cups have become increasingly popular due to their environmental friendliness and cost-effectiveness, as they can be reused for many years.

Hosseinidoust said she was wondering why people weren't using menstrual cups, so she decided to look at the comments on social media posts.

“A lot of them ask, 'What about the clutter?' So that concern is there, whether it’s real or not,” she said.

“It was a simple solution to a simple problem,” Hosseinidoust said.

“It was just a matter of opening the doors and looking at the problem rather than ignoring it, and you could argue that when it comes to the menstrual cycle and women's health, that was the attitude,” she said.

Menstrual products affect the functioning of some people

Dior David, a McMaster University student, told CBC Hamilton that while the process isn't dirty for her, the pills are a “great idea.”

David said that using such a tablet would allow her to change a cup or disk in a public bathroom without having to go to the sink to rinse, and said that if one was available, she would use it.

“Honestly, it would make everything more convenient. I think one of the reasons I decided to empty my cup in the shower is because I want avoid clutter and [a tablet] it will be very easy to deal with,” David said.

Jennifer Abraham, who is also a student at McMaster University, told CBC Hamilton that it's “great to hear about innovation in the menstrual product industry.”

“I think it's important that we have more products, more information about them, so people can choose the option that's best for them,” she said.

Abraham said studies like this are important to promote communication and reduce stigma around menstruation.

“Things like this affect how a woman can function, and it can affect her role in society,” she said.

The tablet can detect and prevent infections

The pills are designed for single use, which defeats the two purposes of menstrual cups: environmental impact and cost-effectiveness.

However, they are also biodegradable, washable, cheap to make, and made from a renewable resource: seaweed.

Hosseinidust said that if the product can help people who menstruate to become more inclined to use a menstrual cup, it could help reduce the billions of disposable menstrual products used around the world every day, essentially “killing several birds with one stone.”

In addition to this, the tablets can also detect conditions such as UTIs, bacterial vaginosis, and staph infections.

Bacteriophages, which were the focus of Hosseinidust's research, are viruses that infect bacteria. She said they can kill bad bacteria without killing good bacteria.

“One of the things we're studying and actively working on is integrating these bacteriophages with some of these menstrual products to detect and get rid of infections,” she said.

This research is already underway, and it could potentially cover all types of products, not just these pills.

Hosseinidoust said that as a researcher, discovering such a large gap in menstrual product innovation work was like discovering a gold mine.

“But at the same time, as a woman who menstruates, you think, 'Really?' – she said.