“The first time I ever leaked I was 29 years old at a boot camp. I was trying to get in better shape after the birth of my first child and I didn’t even know I had leaked urine all over myself until the end of the workout. I literally stood up, didn’t say goodbye to anybody, got into my car and cried. I never went to back to that boot camp and started modifying my lifestyle so, I didn’t work out as hard and stopped running. Then I started gaining weight and with the weight, came worse incontinence,” said Allison Watkins, Inventor, Entrepreneur and Women’s Health Advocate.
We anticipate the birth of our children with delirious excitement. Often, we dismiss the physical trials of pregnancy as temporary, because for the most part they are. But millions of women suffer from postpartum conditions, that alter their long-term physical and mental health.
A recent BMC Public Health study, shows globally, rates are as high as 46% of women who suffer from at least one pelvic floor disorder. And according to the American Journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology, “20% will require surgery in their lifetimes.”
Pelvic floor damage and incontinence in pregnancy, and for many Moms years beyond that, are common. Despite this, there haven’t been great solutions. Women’s health innovation has been slow. In part, because women historically weren’t included in clinical trials. And female founders remain woefully underfunded.
Allison realized that most products designed to support incontinence, were fundamentally, the same. So, she set out to develop something better. A process over the past 8 years that led to the first patient developed, FDA-cleared device for stress incontinence.
Persist Beyond the Problem
Allison didn’t set out to become an inventor, she sought to improve her quality of life. “For a sexually active woman, who wants to have more babies they don’t recommend surgery to fix incontinence. You can do pelvic floor rehabilitation, which I tried for a year. It was expensive and not effective for me.”
After seeking medical treatment, she was disappointed by the limited options. “If you walk through CVS or Walgreens there’s an entire aisle for incontinence. But the majority are absorbency products, invented by men. Which means sitting in your urine and dealing with skin irritation and fear of odor. Now, I had an 11-pound baby, but you’re not required to have an 11-pound baby to have incontinence, it is very common.”
Do Your Research and Get Creative
By the time Allison had her second child, she was wearing pads to prevent leaks. She said, “I really loved kickboxing and whenever I was in class during my period, I was also wearing a super plus tampon and realized, ‘oh my gosh I’m not leaking as much! Why is this?’ So, I started researching anatomy and essentially learned about pessary devices created for prolapse. I didn’t have prolapse, but I began to look at other options. I ordered all the Kegel weights and anything that I could find for pelvic floor health before drawing a picture of something a little different. And then, taking it to the engineer who created our first prototype.”
Build Structure to Honor Your Highest Priorities
Allison said, “I live by my calendar. So, if my daughter is singing, I put that on my calendar like a meeting. Because if I’m sacrificing anything with my kids for this company, then it’s not right.” Founding a business, pursuing financing and managing a team in the competitive medical device field, is intense. She explained that she was raised by entrepreneurs and for each challenge, she finds a way to “figure it out.”
Allison explained, “As a single Mom who has my kids 100% of the time, I also take them with me on business trips. Because I don’t have the luxury of a partner or local family, I’m willing to leave my kids with. So, the travel was a problem with the public school. And it got to the point where that was really stressful for everybody. So, I just homeschooled them.”
And Find Options That Work for Your Family
Wait, what? I had to ask, how could homeschool be less stressful? Allison explained, “We’re fortunate, living in Oklahoma you can have a lot of space for not a lot of money. So, everybody has their area and the teacher we had for homeschool lives in the neighborhood. So, she would come over to my house and teach them while I was in meetings. My daughter is craving social interaction so now she’s in a private school, but my son still homeschools. So, later today I’ll take him to his standing math teacher that helps him with his algebra.”
Design Flexibility into Your Business
Women are starting businesses in record rates. In part because Entrepreneurship tends to mean choosing your own schedule and priorities. But there are different Founder paths, and in most cases, running a company requires a lot more time and mental energy. I asked how she weighs the tradeoffs.
Allison explained “One thing I always knew going into entrepreneurship, and I’ve stuck with it, is that my children come first. I don’t think any entrepreneur works nine to five, but I’ve had to make modifications to my schedule. I wake up at 5:30 and you’ll see emails from me between 5:30 to 7:30 am. That is when I get everything in line for the day and respond to the emails that I wasn’t able to the day before.”
And Create Your Trusted Community
Allison credits hiring people who she describes as, “smarter than her” as key to growing her business. “We have an incredible team of people working on this. Our director of operations has been with me for eight years, we’re also close friends and our kids are friends. So, family really is part of the culture. In the summer sometimes if she has meetings where it’s important that she’s there, I watch her kids and at times, she watches my kids. It’s a community effort, it’s never just me.”
Many thanks to the talented Allison Watkins!
Learn More about Allison’s company and products on their website, and follow her great adventure on LinkedIn, Instagram and Facebook.
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About Allison:
Allison founded Watkins-Conti Products, Inc. in 2016 to pioneer solutions for women’s pelvic health. Following the birth of her children, she experienced stress urinary incontinence (SUI), the involuntary leakage of urine when exerting pressure on the bladder during physical activity. Frustrated by the limited options, she engineered, patented, and manufactured Yōni.Fit, a comfortable and convenient device for the management of SUI. Yōni.Fit is pending FDA approval following completion of a national clinical trial by Urogynecologists at Stanford, NYU, and Jefferson Health.
Allison has raised funds from private investors to create quality management systems, a robust intellectual property portfolio, secure contract manufacturing, conduct clinical trials, and expand her executive team and expert advisers.
An engaging speaker, Allison challenges social taboos around women’s health and well-being. She is passionate about developing treatments that benefit women, and funding for women-led healthcare companies. Allison was recognized in Business Times’ Top 20 under 40, Disrupt magazine’s Top Ten Influential Women, and the Journal Record’s Achievers Under 40.
