Ovulate more than once? Study shows....
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Ovulate more than once? Study shows....
| Tue, 10-14-2003 - 5:27pm |
http://www.msnbc.com/news/936390.asp?cp1=1#BODY
No wonder the rhythm method does not work so well for birth control — scientists in Canada said Tuesday they had found women sometimes ovulate several times a single month.
I just don't buy this.


1) Why the rhythm method doesn't work? Because not all women have regular cycles. And even if they do, it doesn't mean they ovulate on Day 14. For instance, it is looking like a 28-day cycle for me this month, but I o'd on day 18 (I have a short LP, breastfeeding most likely the reason)
2) The rhythm method is very different from other forms of natural birth control like NFP, FAM
3) The reason "natural" birth control fails is because people group rhythm with other methods; because when you use barriers during fertile times (FAM) the method is only as effective as the barrier; people rely on the method too early, etc. When women use NFP (abstinence during fertile times) and chart correctly, it is 98 percent effective (99 percent in a recent study in China.
4) Of the 63 women, only 50 had normal cycles? I think he should have said only 13 didn't have normal cycles. So we're looking at 79 percent women ovulated once a month.
5) Of the 50, 40 percent had waves of follicles? Tell us something we didn't know. You can tell by charting that your body can gear up to O and it doesn't happen. They've known this for about 50 years!
6) Hypothetically, let's say those 13 women are ovulating multiple times but the "hormones" aren't there as the doctor said. If the hormones aren't right, then I'm going to guess it is very unlikely they are going to get pregnant. But I'm not doctor, so I could be wrong.
7) This study was done by a doctor, a VETERINARIAN and a graduate student. What in the world? Later on, it says the phenomenon was first seen in cattle and horses, so I guess that is why the vet is on board.
8) He says this explains why twins can be 3 weeks apart in development. Once again, I am no doctor, but it is typical for one twin to be taking nutrients away from another twin, resulting in one large twin and one small twin. Does this not happen early on in the pregnancy?
9) Women have concealed ovulation? I guess to some degree it may not be as obvious as the animal world, but women emit pheromones, typically have heightened sexual feelings during ovulation, etc., so it isn't like it goes unnoticed. Women in the same household or that start living together end up having parallel cycles because they are emitting the pheromones.
10) We know that women can ovulate more than once, but it happens within a 24-hour period.
11) I am a former journalist (SAHM) so I hate when everybody blames the media, but I think a lot of the media is misinformed about this kind of stuff and is just spoonfed the info. The serious journalist would better be able to digest this info in its reality, but it is difficult for journalists to be able to have the wide range of knowledge necessary to do this correctly.
Wow, what a vent! Now I went to look to see how people are answering this by searching in Yahoo. From what I can find, no scientist group or site has made a comment toward this positive or negative except those from NFP, Billings, etc. While they are obviously on the defense and so could be somewhat biased, they do raise interesting points.
1) Pierson is not an M.D., he has a Ph.D. This may or may not question his credibility on the study.
2) Pierson's study was funded by the drug companies. He does studies on chemical birth control. So he did have vested interest in coming out with a conclusion to show women natural birth control is "unsafe." The study is also being used to say that oral contraceptives fail because of this so they need more hormones and no more 7-days of doing nothing pills=more money for BC.
3) They say that Pierson's conclusions are unfounded and ultrasound studies have been done that support the typical single ovulation and multiple ovulation within 24-hours theory. These include statements from actual scientists not just pro-Billings, NFP people: http://www.rhgateway.org/pipermail/hipnet/2003-August/000044.html
Here are some other answers from these organizations:
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2003/jul/030709a.html
http://www.cin.org/archives/cinnfp/200307/0026.html
http://www.billings-centre.ab.ca/bc_900.htm
http://fructusventris.stblogs.org/archives/001697.html
Now I haven't been able to find the actual study, but I found the summary (you have to pay $30 for the article. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6T6K-48Y525N-P&_user=10&_coverDate=07%2F31%2F2003&_rdoc=1&_fmt=summary&_orig=browse&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=4c7ace040da5817fb9b30c6044536c39
In the actual published report summary, it says the study just proves that some women have multiple waves of follicle development, NOT ovulation. In addition, they did not include the 13 women with irregular cycles. Notice this is the official record that a journal deemed printable, not wide conclusions not scientifically proven by the makers of the study (or what journalists misunderstood).
There is also questions about how many women ovulated multiple times. It doesn't appear any woman ovulated more than twice:
This article says http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/07/24/1058853174440.html that women didn't ovulate several times in their cycle but 6 women ovulated twice. It also doesn't says how far apart these ovulations were. In the msnbc article, it said 13 women ovulated "multiple times." The Billings and NFP comments said only 2 women ovulated more than once and they were having an infertile cycle. Here is the most responsible of all the actual news articles (not related to NFP or Billings http://chealth.canoe.ca/health_news_detail.asp?channel_id=131&news_id=7824. It says only 2 of the women released two eggs. This article says 6 women ovulated twice and 7 didn't ovulate at all http://www.indiandoctors.com/news/1086.php3.
Sorry about all this, but it just upsets me when study results are misconstrued like this. GL to everyone, sticky and positive vibes!
Chanda
WOW Chanda!
Glad to see a fellow journalist on board. I worked at a twice-weekly paper for 3 years before SAH with my DD (now 21 months). Most of the news stories jumped on the bandwagon to bash NFP and eat up the story, although there were one or two that I thought were responsible (like that one from health.ca). I looked up to see if it was talked about on the board in July. Just a few comments like wow, who knew? I mean, maybe it is just me, but when you say "multiple ovulations" it has the connotation of even more than 2. If they would have said a SMALL amount of women ovulated twice, it wouldn't have raised any flags. I would be particularly interested to find out if it was true that they were having "infertile" cycles. If they said women gear up to ovulate in waves, then people who knew any detailed info about cycles would say, "we already knew that." Oh well...
I suspect that I ovulate twice on some cycles because my CM will dry up, cervix closes, yet it will happen again within 24 hours. I might be misjudging the symptoms, but that is what I think is going on. But once again, we already knew that some women do that.
Chanda
Hi
I was editor of a small weekly.