The landscape

Earlier this year, Ovum raised $1.7 million in a pre-seed round – a significant feat considering the stark lack of funding that goes to women-led startups in Australia and globally. 

Ovum, an app that’s designed to be integrated at every point of a woman’s health journey, can help women track their symptoms using voice recognition and uses a chat function for accurate and efficient health tracking. It stores health reports, medications, appointments, cycle tracking and biometric data from wearables all in one place.

Dr Heffernan-Marks is determined to use Ovum to address what she describes as a $1 trillion gender health gap that sees women living in poorer health and with more chronic conditions than men. 

“In Australia, 56% of Australian women over the age of 15 already have at least one chronic health condition, and women are disproportionately suffering with chronic symptoms compared to men,” she explains.

“I also saw that women’s health was being siloed. Even though our physiology is so integrated and so cyclical, we're seeing different doctors at different points in our lifespan, and we're being treated at separate points. 

“When I was in medical school, [what we learnt about] women's health was pregnancy, fertility, menopause and pregnancy complications and that's it.”

Ovum will pioneer the development of the first-ever longitudinal AI women’s health data set. 

Historically, and still today, women are not well represented in research trials which means doctors often base diagnostics and treatments on data that relates to men.

“At a population level, what Ovum is also doing is collecting the first women's health specific AI, longitudinal data set, which we can then feed back into research and into addressing biases in AI as well,” Dr Heffernan-Marks says.

“Our mission is to transform how every woman experiences healthcare, and to really close the gender health gap, which is costing our economy $1 trillion.”

“At a population level, what Ovum is also doing is collecting the first women's health specific AI, longitudinal data set, which we can then feed back into research and into addressing biases in AI as well."
– Dr Ariella Heffernan-Marks, CEO & Founder, Ovum AI

How AI can be used to transform women’s health

While there are valid concerns about the gender bias ingrained in AI, Dr Heffernan-Marks says it can also be a non-judgemental tool that has the potential to support women who may have been let down in traditional healthcare settings. 

“What I found [in my research] is that what AI offers is a non-judgmental space, a space where women can ask questions they maybe wouldn’t otherwise because they are scared of being gaslit or they're fearful,” Dr Heffernan-Marks says.

Ovum is the first holistic AI health assistant for women, she says, explaining that AI is one of the most efficient tools we can utilise to better women’s health experiences.

“What I found [in my research] is that what AI offers is a non-judgmental space, a space where women can ask questions they maybe wouldn’t otherwise because they are scared of being gaslit or they're fearful."
– Dr Ariella Heffernan-Marks, CEO & Founder, Ovum AI

“What we're doing with Ovum, is creating a space where women can set health goals and actually have a conversation and learn about how we should engage in those health goals.

“Because half of the problem is [women] don't know where to go, and a lot of misinformation on social media means that many women are completely overwhelmed.”

Ovum is also utilising AI to help women integrate and collect data on their health in a rapid way, which can be used to help detect patterns in their own bodies.

“Then on a mass scale, what we're doing is using AI to look at millions of women and look at patterns at a really large scale to be able to improve our diagnostics, but also our understanding of women's bodies,” Dr Heffernan-Marks says.

This article was written in partnership with and originally published by Women's Agenda.