Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 06/10/2026It’s really weird that this story on PGT-P presents Simone Collins as just your average mother www.womenshealthmag.com/health/a7386...womenshealthmag.comWould You Pay $50,000 for a Few More IQ Points? Meet The People Willing to Do SoParenthood has always been a gamble. New technologies offer more control than ever—if you can afford it. 030
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 02/10/2026The postmenopausal ovary is often dismissed as a “shriveled husk.” A new Science perspective challenges that idea: the ovary keeps changing after reproduction ends. What it does in those decades deserves much more attention. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...science.orgDoes the postmenopausal ovary still matter?Ovaries may influence health long after their reproductive function ends 063
Reposted by Kristen V. BrownSTAT @statnews.com · 01/10/2026"Vaccine hesitancy, in a lot of ways, is a logical outcome to the cultural pressures we've put before families," says sociologist Jennifer Reich. 3104
Reposted by Kristen V. BrownKashmir Hill @kashhill.bsky.social · 01/10/2026Company creates an AirTag silencer so that a bike thief doesn't realize a bike is being tracked. But of course, that means a person wouldn't know they were being tracked either: sixcolors.com/post/2026/10... via @glennf.comsixcolors.comSilencing AirTags enables stalkers and domestic violenceElevationLab has released an AirTag product I find appalling, and I strongly urge they immediately withdraw it from sale and recall all inventory. The AirTag Silencer is a simple device: remove the… 36924
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 30/09/2026Biotech founder Cathy Tie calls editing human embryos a "moral imperative." Scientists say the work is nowhere near ready, and that even a perfect tool can't guarantee safety. That raises a bigger question: What would safe enough actually look like? My story @wired.com www.wired.com/story/biotec...wired.comA Biotech Founder Makes the Moral Case for Gene-Editing Human EmbryosThe practice of editing the genes of embryos remains highly controversial and risky, but Origin Genomics founder Cathy Tie argues its a “moral imperative” to address hereditary diseases. 112
Reposted by Kristen V. BrownHank Greely @hankgreely.bsky.social · 24/09/2026New blog post from @stanfordclb.bsky.social from fellow Claire McGovern on an interesting paternal age limitation on publicly funded IVF in Denmark. Good discussion of pluses and minuses. law.stanford.edu/2026/09/23/d...law.stanford.eduDoes Paternal Age Matter in Fertility Treatment? | Stanford Law SchoolEarlier this month, Denmark announced that it will introduce an upper age limit for men seeking access to publicly funded fertility treatment. From Ja 002
Reposted by Kristen V. BrownSTAT @statnews.com · 23/09/2026“The maternal mental health needs of women like me have been badly underprioritized in American society,” writes Meg LeDuc. www.statnews.com/2026/09/23/l...statnews.comMentally ill women deserve more support to have children“The maternal mental health needs of women like me have been badly underprioritized in American society,” writes Meg LeDuc. 095
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 24/09/2026The ovaries don't just shut down after menopause. They keep changing—and may take on new roles as they age. But are those changes protective, harmful, or both? Scientists are only beginning to find out. My latest for @wired.com www.wired.com/story/ovary-...wired.comThe Ovary Is Surprisingly Active After Menopause. Scientists Are Trying to Figure Out WhyA growing body of research is putting the ovary in a new light, not as an egg factory with an expiration date, but as an organ that shapes women’s health long after the fertile years have passed. 26721
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 11/09/2026It was probably only a matter of time until this happened 031
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 10/09/2026Was just talking with a fertility doctor today about how she wishes more women got this kind of info about their own bodies earlier! 000
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 10/09/2026AMH isn’t predictive of fertility, but it’s also not totally useless information so not sure I view this as a dangerous trend? www.eurekalert.org/news-release... 100
Reposted by Kristen V. BrownDavid Grimm @david-grimm.bsky.social · 09/09/2026For years, scientists have argued that human births are difficult because of the way evolution shaped our pelvises for upright walking. But a new study argues that fetal sex may also play a role. Interesting story by @bridgetalex.bsky.social for @science.orgscience.orgWhy are human births so difficult? Male babies—not just upright walking—may be to blameAnalysis of 140 species suggests the risks of sons are offset by evolutionary advantages 12810
Reposted by Kristen V. BrownElizabeth Bennett @elizabethbennettjd.bsky.social · 09/09/2026I moved states 4 years ago and have a whole new slate of doctors for whom I’ve filled out a zillion medical histories. Now that you mention it, not a single one asked about my menopausal status. 031
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 09/09/2026Not every 50 year old woman has gone through menopause. (My own mother hadn’t until close to 60). Knowing what stage of life your patient is in seems absolutely relevant to their care. Age at menopause is also relevant to many health risks. It’s also difficult to study without this data. 110
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 09/09/2026I’m guessing many of those patients were not over 60. 100
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 09/09/2026Only 14% of women with menopause actually had it documented in their electronic health record. That seems like a pretty big ommission! www.eurekalert.org/news-release...eurekalert.orgMenopause is missing from most electronic health records, study findsMenopause is frequently missing from women’s electronic health records, according to a University of Colorado Anschutz study of nearly 396,000 women participating in the National Institutes of H... 252
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 09/09/2026Ghosts in your genome www.nature.com/articles/s41...nature.comTracing ‘ghost’ ancestry in modern humans - Nature GeneticsNature Genetics - Tracing ‘ghost’ ancestry in modern humans 111
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 09/09/2026The Tl;DR from this dueling package: No one knows how AI will change health care, other than to say it will definitely change it www.statnews.com/2026/09/09/a... www.statnews.com/2026/09/09/a...statnews.comAMA CEO: AI won’t replace doctors — it will work alongside them“The goal should not be to reproduce today’s health care system with fewer humans,” writes American Medical Association CEO John Whyte. 020
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 09/09/2026Whether or not humans can get pregnant in space, my question is what woman would WANT to be pregnant while also dealing with space travel www.nationalgeographic.com/science/arti...nationalgeographic.comCan Humans Get Pregnant in Space?From microgravity to intense radiation risks, the quirks of space travel raises some big questions about how they might affect a developing fetus. 042
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 07/09/2026I am pro anything that involves more bats www.eurekalert.org/news-release...eurekalert.orgBats as a form of biological pest controlLabour-intensive harvesting, complex processing: the macadamia is one of the most expensive nuts in the world. This makes it all the more important to protect the trees from pests. An international re... 091
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 01/09/2026Really glad we’ve moved past this particular strategy 000
Reposted by Kristen V. BrownChristopher D. Brown @cdbrow1.bsky.social · 31/08/2026This is all I know about the subject. 011
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 31/08/2026I learned while reporting this story that different animals’ sperm looks different. Mouse sperm is INSANE 100
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 31/08/2026For decades, old ideas about masculinity and femininity kept science from understanding how sperm actually works. I dug into why male fertility science stalled — and what's finally changing. For GQ: www.gq.com/story/male-i...gq.comNo Sperm Left Behind: Modern Medicine’s Race to Solve Male InfertilityFor decades our understanding of sperm could be summed up as: The strongest swimmer gets the girl. New research reveals that men’s fertility is not so simple. 100
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 24/08/2026Interesting because it runs contrary to previous research. "MHT appears to exert a modest but meaningful and statistically significant protective effect on the risk of developing Alzheimer’s pathology,” one of the researchers said in a release. 000
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 24/08/2026Social media may lead you to believe that hormone therapy protects against a whole lot of things, but much of those claims haven't actually been proven. An interesting new study suggests women on estrogen-only hormone therapy have a reduced risk of Alzheimer's www.eurekalert.org/news-release...eurekalert.orgStudy ties estrogen-based menopausal hormone therapy to lower Alzheimer’s riskSome studies have reported that menopausal hormone therapy raises dementia risk. A new study that analyzed Alzheimer’s-disease hallmarks in autopsied brains indicates the opposite. 110
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 24/08/2026The AI slop PR pitches are outta control. Twice already this am I have written back to publicists saying I actually have no idea what they are pitching me 000
Reposted by Kristen V. BrownKristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 12/08/2026Have you started bypassing your doctor, instead using consumer blood tests, wearables, AI, or telehealth? If so, I want to hear from you! DM me or email kristenvbrown@gmail.com 022
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 12/08/2026Dear editors: sorry my next story may be filed a bit late. 000
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 12/08/2026Have you started bypassing your doctor, instead using consumer blood tests, wearables, AI, or telehealth? If so, I want to hear from you! DM me or email kristenvbrown@gmail.com 022
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 10/08/2026Honestly love the Hallmark Channel. Sometimes you just need a formulaic romcom www.nytimes.com/2026/08/10/s...nytimes.comWhat the Hallmark Channel Knows About LoveFor 25 years, it’s helped big-city gals find love with hometown hunks — and distracted the rest of us when we need it most. 010
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 27/07/2026In my reporting for my forthcoming book I’ve heard from some women today that their doctors are still doling out this sort of advice. Ping me if you have ever had a doctor tell you get pregnant to treat a health concern. 001
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 27/07/2026My aunt was going through some old boxes of things and found this clipping she saved about endometriosis from my hometown paper, The OC Register, in 1982. It refers to endometriosis as “the career women’s disease.” And the cure? Pregnancy! 240
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 24/07/2026You have to remember that those women who stopped or never got hormone therapy they’re not all in the Alzheimer ward or dead from heart disease." New piece out today JAMA digs into the meno-hype. jamanetwork.com/journals/jam...jamanetwork.comNavigating the New Booming Marketplace for Menopause CareThis Medical News article discusses how a surge in demand for menopause care has fueled a rapidly expanding marketplace of treatments and examines where the evidence supports these emerging approaches... 000
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 23/07/2026If you have ever felt like suddenly everything is perimenopause, this story is for you www.bloomberg.com/news/feature...bloomberg.comThe Menopause Gold Rush Is Failing WomenWhile startups and supplements are making billions, the healthcare mainstream hasn’t kept pace with women’s midlife needs. 110
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 23/07/2026As for me, the answer to my night sweats didn’t turn out to require HRT. They were the result of one too many blankets piled on the bed. More noise has not meant better treatment. Full story: www.bloomberg.com/news/feature...bloomberg.comThe Menopause Gold Rush Is Failing WomenWhile startups and supplements are making billions, the healthcare mainstream hasn’t kept pace with women’s midlife needs. 120
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 23/07/2026A 2023 survey found roughly 70% of responding OB-GYN residency programs had no menopause curriculum at all. Only 1.7% of US women 40 and up were on systemic hormone therapy in 2023. 120
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 23/07/2026Take Yasmin Harris: She spent years chasing symptoms. She tried black cohosh, ashwagandha, Steel-Libido and a compounded hormone therapy cream. Only after more than a decade did she find the right doctor — what worked was a low-dose estrogen patch which virtually erased her symptoms. 100
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 23/07/2026The menopause conversation has never been louder — the market is crowded with books, podcasts, celebrity supplement lines and doctors-turned-influencers trying to sell you a weighted vest. False choices are now extremely available. But for a lot of women, the right care often remains out of reach. 100
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 23/07/2026To be a middle-aged woman is to live in diagnostic suspense, perpetually one symptom away from wrestling with “the transition.” 100
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 23/07/2026Six months before my 40th birthday, the menopause content arrived in my feed. It was very convincing. So I got my hormones tested at a Chinatown lab and booked appointments with a bunch of telehealth startups. "It seems that you are perimenopausal,” a doctor at one of the companies concluded. 100
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 23/07/2026Women were once told to suffer through menopause in silence. Now they’re navigating a cacophony of supplements, hormone subscriptions, influencers and dubious promises. My new story on the menopause boom—and why women still aren’t getting enough trustworthy care: www.bloomberg.com/news/feature...bloomberg.comThe Menopause Gold Rush Is Failing WomenWhile startups and supplements are making billions, the healthcare mainstream hasn’t kept pace with women’s midlife needs. 182
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 07/07/2026It's never made sense to me that donor eggs could fix every issue of aging and fertility — the uterus, after all, ages, too. Now a new study shows age-related changes in the womb impact pregnancy success even with donor eggs after 49. www.bbc.com/news/article...bbc.comWomen hit fertility tipping point at 49 even with young donor eggsAge-related changes in the womb lining may be the cause and could be treatable in the future, say experts. 030
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 01/07/2026If you ever wondered how space travel might impact your fertility, well, here you go: www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1...pnas.orgFemale reproductive dysfunction and transgenerational consequences following prolonged spaceflight exposure | PNASSpaceflight presents unique gravitational, radiation, and isolation hazards for human exploration of the Moon, Mars, and beyond, yet its impact on ... 031
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 30/06/2026This is the smartest thing I’ve read on the genome in a long time. The metaphor of DNA as ”code” I sometimes think has been more hurtful than helpful www.quantamagazine.org/why-the-huma...quantamagazine.orgWhy the Human Genome’s Tangled Physicality May Confound AI | Quanta MagazineOur genetic heritage is not a blueprint or an algorithm, as many biologists have imagined, but something else entirely. 001
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 30/06/2026Study finds hormonal birth control could have a protective effect on the brain later in life. One thing this highlights that is definitely understudied is the long-term effects of taking BC news.ku.edu/news/article...news.ku.eduStudy finds estrogen-based hormone therapies could protect brain health in older womenClick for more on research in NeuroImage 010
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 30/06/2026PS. I do think tracking devices for pets are generally overkill ( I wrote about it a few years ago!) but this dude has a heart condition so he wears a monitor. Still might be overkill, though. 010
Kristen V. Brown @kristenvbrown.bsky.social · 30/06/2026I have never once gotten a perfect sleep score. My cat on the other hand: 120