Evvy is a female-founded biotech startup demystifying the female body. Starting with the vaginal microbiome, they are proud to have launched the first annual Equal Research Day on June 10.
What is Equal Research Day?
June 10 is the 29th anniversary of the passing of the 1993 National Institutes of Health (NIH) Revitalization Act. The NIH created this law to require that women should be included in clinical research studies. Equal Research Day commemorates this historic moment. It also recognizes how far we still have to go to close the gender health gap.
On average, women receive diagnoses four years later than men across hundreds of diseases. Women are more likely to die from heart attacks, react poorly to prescription drugs and have symptoms dismissed by doctors. Through Equal Research Day, Evvy aims to raise awareness of how excluding female-bodied people in scientific and medical research for centuries has manifested in today’s persistent gender health gap.
“The female body shouldn’t be a medical mystery,” said Priyanka Jain, CEO and Co-founder of Evvy. “We started Evvy to demystify the female body through comprehensive data. We believe it’s a critical part of closing the gender health gap. Starting Equal Research Day this year has been exciting”
“I joined Evvy to pioneer a better standard of care for women while also growing a brand that is empowering women to better understand their own bodies,” said Dr. Kelle Moley, Obstetrician Gynecologist, physician, scientist and Evvy Advisor. “Equal Research Day is an initiative we are so proud to cement. It’s one that we hope will be a catalyst to rectify the historical exclusion of women in studies.”
Evvy’s goal
Evvy seeks to inspire everyone to take action to close the gender health gap, specifically where women are:
- Underfunded by donating to its Equal Research Day partner the Society for Women’s Health Research, a nonprofit dedicated to promoting research on biological sex differences in disease;
- Underresearched by discovering female-focused clinical trials and consider volunteering for one;
- Underdiagnosed by learning more about how the relative lack of research on the female body manifests in healthcare disparities today;
- Undervalued by creating a virtual community via the #EqualResearchDay hashtag and resharing the day’s manifesto;
- Unequal by encouraging people to share their stories of inequality in the healthcare system via #EqualResearchDay across social platforms to show other women that they are not alone.
Evvy will be selling an exclusive collection of merchandise to benefit the nonprofit.
“Without equal research, there can never be equal care,” said Laine Bruzek. She is Evvy’s Chief Marketing Officer and Co-Founder. “We hope Equal Research Day will be a rallying call for doctors, researchers, policymakers and the wider community to work together to build a world where female health is finally understood and where medical bias has no place.”
For more information and to shop the Equal Research Day collection benefiting the Society for Women’s Health Research, visit EqualResearchDay.com
About Evvy
Evvy is on a mission to radically reinvent how we understand and treat the female body. Evvy’s first product, the Evvy Vaginal Health Test, is the first-ever at-home vaginal microbiome test to use metagenomic sequencing. It can tell you what’s up down there, why it matters and what you can do about it.
Founded by Stanford alums Priyanka Jain and Laine Bruzek, the Evvy team includes scientists, designers, doctors and entrepreneurs. This includes a group of leading OBGYNs and vaginal microbiome researchers with decades of experience at organizations like UCSF, Stanford, Harvard, Cleveland Clinic, and more.
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