10043120Technical feasibility study for an at-home multiplex lateral flow test for monitoring biomarkers in menstrual blood for polycystic ovary syndrome.ClosedGrant for R&DInnovate UKWoost Ltd is a new fem-tech start-up who are dedicated to the development of novel technologies to significantly improve the awareness and diagnosis of gynaecological health conditions starting with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS), an ovarian dysfunction. We are devoted to building a community, in which women's health concerns are effectively targeted and more importantly, being heard. In the current healthcare ecosystem women experiencing any symptoms have to overcome restrictions on availability and accessibility and travel to the doctor's office to receive medical help. After attending their appointments, 4 in 5 women felt they were not properly listened to by healthcare professionals leading to disheartening experiences women have been through from their long journey to diagnosis. PCOS has a direct relation to the emergence of life-threatening diseases (e.g. diabetes) and thus an earlier diagnosis is tremendously important for women's quality of life. And yet, the pandemic further limited the accessibility to healthcare and enhanced concerns around the resulting delayed diagnoses for these women. Woost's mission is to eliminate these restrictions and provide women the support they need to take control of their own health journey. We put women at the centre of their healthcare needs by directly offering them diagnostic tools to understand the basis of their symptoms. Women can join our digital platform and order our at-home test kits to examine menstrual blood for an earlier diagnosis of PCOS. Having access to their results from the comfort of their home eliminates any previously experienced location- and time-specific constraints and facilitates an earlier and more detailed diagnosis of gynaecological conditions. Providing remote triage, we are removing the need for clinicians to perform routine analytical testing and thus we are increasing the time clinicians can now spend on patient engagement and disease treatment. Woost's menstrual blood tests will be easy-to-use, affordable and accessible to be used by any woman anywhere to monitor their gynaecological well-being.