Why Women’s Migraines, and not Men's?

I often get asked this question. Why do you help women’s migraines and not men’s? If you can help women, surely you can help men as well?

Well. 

Here is the scoop. (While we authentically acknowledge the world is full of nuances and individuality.)

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Women are biologically different from men. 

If men are racing cars, women are Transformers. Each time a woman transforms, she risks damaging her machine. It is more complex to maintain.

For example, blood volume deficiency is one of the leading causes of women's migraines. Consider how much blood a woman loses and needs to replenish in her lifetime - can you take a guess? 

Almost 5 times her total blood volume! 

And that is only an average. For some of us, you can double (if not triple) that. Here are my quick maths:

35ml of blood loss per cycle

456ml of blood loss per year

38 years (approx) with menstruation

17.3 litres of blood loss in reproductive years

2.3 litres of extra blood produced then lost per child a woman bears

2.5 children per woman on average globally

23 litres of total blood loss per lifetime

4.6 times the blood volume of one human is lost by a woman in her lifetime

Migraines are a resounding example of our differences. While girls have about the same chances of having migraines as boys (4.9% vs 5.1%), as a girl reaches puberty, that proportion triples or quadruples to reach 18% of women. We acknowledge that a blood volume deficiency can cause these migraines.

The Chinese have a very old saying - “If you have cured 10 men, you still have not cured 1 woman”. We embrace that wisdom. 

Ultimately, we would love to eventually have the infrastructure to help everyone. But we have decided to start with women, because we know that – when it comes to health – we have been underserved. 

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This is about to change.

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