The Importance of a Healthy Vaginal Microbiome

Episode Highlights With Priyanka

• How her own health journey led to her helping women with health using her background in the data world 
• Why were women not included in clinical research until 1993, and why are women diagnosed years later than men for the same conditions
• How to actually make the best use of data that we now have access to
• Vaginal discomfort is the leading reason women seek medical help in the US
• At any given moment, 30% of women have some form of vaginal dysbiosis 
• The reason the vagina is meant to be acidic 
• What her data set on the vaginal microbiome is showing and what we can learn from it
• The most common vaginal dysbiosis and what we can learn from it
• 84% of people with vaginal dysbiosis have no symptoms and get no treatment
• 66% of people who have a yeast infection actually have something else
• The role sex plays in the vaginal microbiome 
• What boric acid is and the real data on the research here
• Do vaginal probiotics work? And what to know about them
• How vaginal health affects fertility, pregnancy, and birth and what to know to optimize this

Resources We Mention

• Evvy
• Invisible Women by Caroline Criado Perez