Imagine a world in which women get to control when—or even if—they go through menopause. This is the vision CEO Daisy Robinton, PhD, set forth when she cofounded Oviva Therapeutics, a company dedicated to answering the many unanswered questions in female physiology through innovative biomedical research and the development of therapeutics that will delay the decline of the ovaries.
Get a preview of Oprah Daily’s interview with Robinton and watch the full video below.
Why are ovaries so essential to women’s health?
Ovarian health is a fundamental pillar of our overall health and well-being. It really sustains us, and unfortunately, the ovaries age at an accelerated rate relative to the rest of the body.
As a woman approaches menopause, the number of eggs she has, a.k.a. her ovarian reserve, declines. And once this hits the low threshold, that is a trigger for menopause. When the ovaries stop functioning, women have increased risk of cardiovascular disease, osteoporosis, immune dysfunction, neurocognitive decline, problems with sleep, problems with sex.
So in supporting the function of the ovaries for a longer period of time, we’re hoping that we’re ultimately supporting the health of women for a longer period of time. In other words, if you can slow that decline, you could potentially forestall menopause or choose not to have it altogether.
Was it surprising to you how under-researched, under-resourced women’s health is?
There’s not a lot of resources for women to understand their own health, but also there’s a lack of research in this space, a lack of understanding of female physiology that’s been historic in biomedical research and clinical development. I was really shocked to discover how underrepresented female physiology was in not only biomedical research but also clinical development. It wasn’t until 2016 that female animals were required to be included in NIH-funded studies, and it wasn’t until the early nineties that female people were mandated to be included in clinical trials.
What inspired you to start Oviva Therapeutics?
I think a big piece of it is being a woman of reproductive age, interested in having children and being curious about my own health, and then realizing through that discovery that there was a lot I didn’t know—that nobody knew because of the historic underrepresentation of female subjects in clinical studies.
I asked myself, what would we know about human biology if we had dedicated the same amount of attention to study female physiology as we have to male physiology? And how has this impacted us more broadly as a society?
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In a refreshingly candid conversation with Oprah Daily Insiders, Oprah, Maria Shriver, Drew Barrymore, and doctors Sharon Malone, Heather Hirsch, and Judith Joseph, we set the record straight on all things menopause. Become an Oprah Daily Insider now to get access to this conversation and the full “The Life You Want” Class library.
