Archive link to story here: https://archive.ph/HVNLH

Posted here because there is no community for Absolutely Infuriating (that I know of).

  • Throwaway@lemm.ee
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    1 year ago

    I imagine that its extremely hard to get the mass quantities of blood you need for actual testing.

    • Mouselemming@sh.itjust.works
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      1 year ago

      I’m still not satisfied because menstrual blood is much chunkier than a donated pint from your arm. Until they’re using mucus blood we’re still in the dark ages.

      • Risk@feddit.uk
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        1 year ago

        Eh - it depends on the test.

        Laboratory tests for pure absorbency makes sense for blood volume.

        Functional absorbency is always going to be so much more nuanced as each woman has multiple factors in play. You’re better off calibrating pure absorbency first, then carrying those results forward to study and understand functional usage.

        • Mouselemming@sh.itjust.works
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          1 year ago

          I guess it depends on your goal: better tampons or better healthcare. Is the problem that you can’t switch brands and have any expectation of similar absorbency? Or is the problem that your doctor asks “how many tampons do you use in a day?” and thinks it will tell him whether you really have a heavy flow, because he doesn’t believe you and doesn’t really understand how periods work? Both are real problems. Both deserve better research.

        • Mouselemming@sh.itjust.works
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          1 year ago

          Iirc, weren’t lots of women going to send their used pads and tampons to that GOP politician something something monitor schedule to detect abortions…?

          I’m post-menopause and post-hysterectomy myself so I didn’t pay complete attention, just sort of cheered them on.

          Anyway you could start by doing a study based on recording the real-life experiences of a large pool of women who self-identify as having “normal” periods. To set a baseline at least, by which to judge “heavy” bleeding.

          Or a smaller pool who are willing to alternate cup and tampons to better measure capacity. I think pouring from cup to tampon would be inaccurate because pressure from the vaginal wall affects tampon capacity.

    • JoBo@feddit.ukOP
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      1 year ago

      Maybe, maybe not. Blood stocks are precious but they do go out of date and blood banks would jump at the chance to do something useful with the wastage. It would also be perfectly possible to do RCTs with actual women. At the very least, it would be possible to produce a liquid with the right sort of viscosity instead of using water or saline. It’s just so ridiculously shit.

      • Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        And I’m not sure about the cow stuff, but pig blood is almost completely identical to human blood down to the subatomic level, so shouldn’t present many if any aberrations when compared to real life intended use!

        • Soggy@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Mammal blood is all pretty much the same for something like this. Terrestrial mammals anyway, I don’t want to guess at the limits of adaptation for things like whales.

        • HeartyBeast@kbin.social
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          1 year ago

          Steel girders, pizza and bath mats are all identical to human blood at the sub atomic level. Best to compare at the molecular level