First Canadian ENDOSURE baby after 7- years unexplained infertility

The journey through infertility can be deeply personal and challenging, especially for healthcare professionals who face their battles while also helping others. Registered Nurse Ashleigh, is the first Canadian woman to overcome unexplained infertility and endometriosis with the ENDOSURE diagnostic test for endometriosis. We interviewed Ashleigh to hear her story and to share a message with those grappling with unexplained infertility, that real answers and hope are here.

Ashleigh’s experiences is not unique; 7- years of infertility with no explainable cause. Limited and expensive artificial reproductive technology (ART) offerings like IUI and IVF as her only choice,  underlying causes not fully investigated.

What was unique was Ashleigh’s deep intuition that ART was not the right path for her, her insights as a healthcare professional, and the emergence of breakthrough electroviscerography technology (EVG) to detect endometriosis non-invasively and rapidly, also known as ENDOSURE test. Combined, she radically transformed her care pathway. Ashleigh exchanged:

We’re talking to Ashleigh about several key areas: the relationship between endometriosis and fertility; current diagnostic options in Canada for fertility treatments; an in-depth analysis of ENDOSURE technology; and common questions patients have regarding their options when they face the “non-diagnosis” of “unexplained infertility”.

Baby Elijah was born in Alberta in May 2026. He’s remarkable. Seven years of infertility, his mother Ashleigh was one of the first women diagnosed with ENDOSURE in June 2025. Because of the diagnosis, she was able to access excisement surgery which resolved her infertility within 6 weeks. Not only was Elijah a surprise, the ease of the pregnancy, the ease of the birth and the fact that he is healthy in every way underscores the importance of identifying diseases prospectively and treating them appropriately to protect both the baby and mother’s health.

Ashleigh is a remarkable person. She’s an RN dedicated to improving patients’ lives through her medical expertise. Her intimate journey through infertility has not only shaped her resolve but has also provided her with a unique lens through which to view diagnostics and treatment options and to identify what fertility investigations were missing. Her determination to understand the underlying causes of her infertility, ultimately led her to learn about advanced technologies. She has generously shared her experience for others.

Ashleight’s educational and working background as an RN allowed her to approach fertility challenges with a unique synthesis of empathy and professional knowledge. Medical insights gained through her training enhance her understanding of fertility, testing and treatments. Able to see and call out the obvious “blind spots” in current care offerings, Ashleigh drew from clinical experiences to advocate for more comprehensive treatment options. This integrated perspective shapes her discussions about unexplained infertility and the importance of finding out “why” and empowered her to confidently be the first patient to receive this treatment journey for endometriosis caused infertility.

Ashleigh shared her deeply personal 7-year journey through infertility and how ENDOSURE technology provided clarity and hope after years of uncertainty. Beginning in 2018, she and her husband struggled with unexplained infertility, a diagnosis she found particularly challenging as it left them with more questions than answers. Despite being offered common fertility treatments such as IUI and IVF, she knew in her heart these options weren’t didn’t answer important questions and prompted her to seek alternative diagnostics.

Discovering a highly rated fertility clinic in Calgary, Ashleigh engaged in a thorough process of cycle tracking and medication management over several months, which eventually led to the suspicion of endometriosis. She underwent the ENDOSURE EVG test, a 30-minute, noninvasive and 99% accurate diagnostic test that confirmed the presence of endometriosis, after years of uncertainty. This diagnosis was a moment of relief, as it provided concrete evidence and guided treatment next-steps.

Ashleigh travelled to Vancouver for laparoscopic excisement surgery, where three endometriosis lesions were removed, primarily located on her bowel and bladder rather than directly on her reproductive system. She was given a stage-2 diagnosis of endometriosis. Unexpectedly, Ashleigh became pregnant six weeks post-surgery, a milestone that confirmed that endometriosis was the cause of her unexplained infertility and demonstrated the effectiveness of excisement of disease through minimally invasive laparoscopic surgery by a highly trained pelvio-plastic surgeon. This offers so much hope to others facing similar challenges. While the pregnancy went smoothly, Ashleigh notes the importance of awareness that endometriosis can increase risks of pregnancy complications, highlighting the value of specialized excisement surgery pre-pregnancy.

The physical and emotional toll of infertility over so many years was obviously profound.

“Seven years of my life.”Ashleigh recounted the impact it had on many facets of her daily life and relationships and she emphasizes the importance of women’s self-advocacy in healthcare, sharing that despite concrete diagnostic evidence, some healthcare providers remained dismissive, underscoring ongoing challenges in women’s health.

Ashleigh expressed a strong recommendation for others experiencing similar symptoms to pursue ENDOSURE testing early, describing it as “the key that unlocks the door to understanding and effective treatment”.

EVG, or electroviscerography, is a analytical tool that records electrical activity (called gastro-intestinal myoelectric activity (GIMA)) from the muscle cells of the gut. It’s like an electrocardio gram/ECG but instead of electrical activity in the heart muscle, it records electrical activity in the gut muscles. Those with endometriosis and/or adenomyosis have a unique electical signature we call the “GIMA Biomarker of Endometriosis”. It’s simple. And it’s highly accurate – 99.97% for those 35 years and under, and 98.5% for those 36 years and older.

So how does a diagnosis of endometriosis help address unexplained infertility? Because instead of treating infertility, you can treat endometriosis. And there are several additional treatment options for endometriosis, including medical treatments, surgical treatments and even lifestyle, dietary, physio and supplements treatment. Lastly, let’s not forget the relief of finally KNOW WHY and the empowerment that something can be done to treat the real problem – endometriosis.

Ashleigh did make one thing clear – ENDOSURE can be the key to not only explaining “unexplained infertility” but the key to unlocking more treatment options, and she encouraged others to consider testing early when answers are not forthcoming.

The truth is, ENDOSURE is just a decision support tool – a diagnostic system that simply and accurately detects endometriosis non-invasively. But decision support for your physician helps tackle unexplained infertility by providing an accurate diagnosis of endometriosis without a diagnostic surgery or waiting months for imaging scans (TVUS and MRI have months or even years long waitlists and still miss early stage disease). These insights can guide your healthcare providers to targetd treatment options that address the endometriosis and can result in successful conception by resolving the underlying cause of infertility.

Endometriosis is a significant cause or contributor to infertility. The most common estimation is 1 in 3 infertility patients are affected by endometriosis. Some studies cite much higher incidences (studies citing from 77% up to 85% of infertility patients being affected based on minimally invasive laparoscopic surgery). The action is not entirely known, but a highly inflammatory environment in the peritoneal cavity is one popular explanation. For Ashleigh, she was shocked to find that resolution of bladder and bowel endometriosis lesions, seemingly unrelated to her reproductive system at all, would so quicky resolve infertilility. What we do know is endometriosis affects millions of women worldwide (we estimate at least 1.3 million in Canada). We also know 1 in 6 couples struggle with infertility. Now that Tier-1 diagnostics are available for endometriosis, research can finally advance.

No provincial public healthcare system in Canada has added ENDOSURE test to their schedule of medical benefits. At this point in time, TIER-1 point of care testing for endometriosis in Canada is still private-pay. On the other hand, several insurance companies have covered ENDOSURE test as part of their fertility testing options, as a component of medical testing for other serious symptoms such as debilitating pain, or within the patient’s health spending accounts.

Ashleigh was able to get insurance coverage for ENDOSURE testing by reaching out to their insurance company. Referrals from your healthcare provider for testing can be a valuable document when making an insurance claim, along with receipts and letters of results.

The entire transcript of the interview follows:

[00:00:00] Welcome to Endometriosis A to Z. We’re here to separate fact from fiction, from old myths to current reality, and to dive deep into the latest research and medical interventions that can help endometriosis sufferers. And our guests will help us explore what’s really happening, offering insights and hope along the way.

Whether you’re living with endometriosis, supporting someone who is, or simply curious, you’re in the right place. Let’s demystify endometriosis, one episode at a time.

Ashley, welcome today. You and baby Elijah are the very first mother and baby to have benefited- Thank you

from the Endosure EVG, tier one technology that’s available for endometriosis diagnosis. And, we’ve, we’ve traveled together on this healthcare journey. I as, as a clinician who was trying to advocate for you and, and place you in the hands of, of the correct people so that we could further along and investigate underlying, conditions that were leading to your, to your healthcare concerns.

I’m so pleased that I was able to travel this journey- Mm-hmm … with you and so we have this good news that has come out at the end of it. It’s the outcome we were hoping for. And so today, we’re going to have this conversation so that you can relay your story and your struggles, your hopes, your fears.

Um, you can relay that to other listeners that may find out about this. Um, and hopefully help them in turn. So, let’s get on just by learning, a little bit more about, yourself. The things that you’re comfortable with disclosing about your background, your history, what brought you to, the fertility care program, what brought you, to the Endosure, test itself.

So our journey started like everybody else’s, at the very beginning trying to have a baby. So ours started in 2018, and unfortunately nothing happened, nothing happened, nothing happened.

And you do what you’re always told, and you go to see your family doctor, and they send you to a referral for a fertility clinic, and you start the process. Well, we started the process and everything came back… They couldn’t find anything. Unexplained infertility. And, that was probably the hardest thing to ever be diagnosed with because you’re left with more questions than answers, and you’re still at square one with no further diagnostics, right?

So they said, “We can offer you IUI, we can offer you IVF,” just like- Everybody’s offered. But we knew in our heart of hearts that that wasn’t our journey, [00:03:00] so we didn’t pursue that. More years went by, and my husband actually changed jobs, and, as part of his benefit package, received f- a lump sum of money that you would be able to use for fertility treatments.

So all of a sudden that light bulb kind of goes on, like, well, let’s see what’s out there. I didn’t like what we saw before, but what else is out there? And that’s how I stumbled across you guys back… I think now this was three years ago. I was flabbergasted that there was a clinic in Calgary who could have five stars.

How on earth could a fertility clinic have five stars? That’s impossible. How could everybody be happy? That was my thoughts. So you start reading the reviews and- I was in tears. I was like, “That’s, that’s me too. That’s me too. That’s me too.” So I reached out to you guys and started the process, started learning about my cycles, started tracking, started getting on medications, learning about all different things that I didn’t even know was part of my journey.

Later down the road, we figured out that there was a probable, h- very high likelihood that I had endometriosis based on the tracking and what you were seeing. So we tried that ENDOSURE test, And my husband’s like, “Well, let’s just hope for nothing.” And in my head I’m like, “No, but I really want there to be something.

I want answers. I want something concrete. I want something that puts us one step further in the right direction.” So I was really optimistic for results at that test.

Um, we were there for hours, even though the test was only 30 minutes. We were there for hours because I was so curious, and she was teaching me all of this stuff and showing me what they were looking for. Um, but she strapped electrodes on, uh, my stomach and put me in a zen mode, dimmed the lights down, had the electrodes on for a little bit, and came back, that the test was showing endometriosis, which was such a relief.

I don’t know if that makes sense, but it was such a relief to have a diagnosis Now there’s something that we can do to work on that, right? So, she put in a referral to surgeons in Vancouver. I’m in Calgary, so it was a hope and a prayer that they would take an out-of-province patient. The surgeon did, thank the Lord.

I went to Vancouver in June of 2025,

For the surgery, and, it ended up being Stage 2. He removed three lesions, none of which were in my, reproductive system itself. They had all left the reproductive system. They were mostly around my bowel and my bladder. So I’m instantly thinking, “Well, is that gonna mean anything? Does that [00:06:00] mean anything’s changed?

Is that gonna help at all?” And to find out I was pregnant six weeks later. That’s, that’s amazing And, you know, it’s not the first time where I’ve seen women who have come back post-surgery and become pregnant immediately within one or two months- Yeah … many times before the three-month period of time. And it was a similar reaction, to yours, where they say, “This is impossible.

I’ve been waiting X number of years.” In your case, you were waiting seven years- Yeah … to achieve pregnancy. And so when it happens, they don’t quite believe it. And at the same time, they have all of these emotions that come up. They’re angry because nobody told them what they had. They’re angry because the healthcare system let them down.

They went for help. They were told it was unexplained and- Yeah … they didn’t dig deeper, which is really, I think, what women are looking for when they go to a fertility clinic, one of the artificial reproductive centers. They’re thinking, “Now I’m going to get answers.” Yeah. And they come back with more questions.

Yeah. And, and so, the, the relief- Mm … is another emotion you must have been feeling- Oh, hugely … in addition to happiness, but maybe also a little bit of fear that, “Okay, so I’ve achieved pregnancy now. Now I’ve got to hold onto it and have a healthy pregnancy.” Yeah. So I can only imagine all of these mixed emotions at that time, but now you’re in a different, you know, place.

Now we have to deal with pregnancy. And of course, one of the things that most clinicians, don’t realize is that endometriosis itself does have an impact on pregnancy complications. So we can see increased rates of things like placenta previa, hemorrhage, during the pregnancy and delivery, and, premature births.

So by knowing that you had endometriosis present, it just allowed you to have an even higher level of care brought to you because knowing that, opened so many doors for better obstetrical care. So I’d like to go back now a little bit, just because we’ve been talking about, the pregnancy a little bit here.

One of the things that you mentioned was that, your test result showed that you were highly positive for- Mm-hmm … endometriosis. One of the benefits of ENDOSURE is that, it is a medical device that is surgically verified. So when we know it’s more than 99% accurate at giving an endometriosis diagnosis, that’s because it has been surgically verified in, evidence-based medicine or peer-reviewed, literature that is out there.

So- Now you’ve [00:09:00] had the surgery and, stage two was found, and it was on your bowel and bladder. Yeah. And only three lesions, so I mean, that would be a relief, but again, when women have endometriosis, they’re sort of expecting, “Oh, it’s gonna be all over my body. It’s, i- in the reproductive tract. It’s gonna be on my ovaries.

It’s, it’s, it’s going to be impacting my reproductive system.” So what a surprise that it was mostly on the bowel and bladder. Yeah. But what we do know is that even small amounts of these lesions can cause a great deal of, pain- Mm-hmm … and complications or, advanced, issues with women, and in your case, that’s exactly what happened is that this- Yeah

this small amount was impacting your ability, to achieve pregnancy. 77% of women, with infertility will have endometriosis, and actually 85% of them will have a risk of, miscarriage. So this, was a real eye-opener for you for sure. Big time. Yes. So what did you think exactly when you got that diagnosis with it being stage two and on your bowel and bladder?

Did you think that it was still a possibility to get pregnant? No. To be honest, I was like, “Well, how is that gonna help?” Yeah. And even the surgeon’s- … like, “Well, you might still need IVF. Like, see what happens, right? Like, y- we’ll… T- time will tell.” Um, so you take that advice, right? He’s the expert.

He does this all the time. Like, this may be the key that we’re looking for, but maybe it’s not. I don’t know. And, I proved him wrong. I couldn’t- So- Honestly, I couldn’t believe it, how quickly it happened, and I, I wish… Obviously, things happen for a reason, but I wish that I would’ve known this sooner.

Like, why did it have to take so long? Yeah. Yeah. Seven years of my life. Like, it… And it… I would never wish this journey on anybody, and I… My heart goes out to people who want a baby and can’t. Like, I… Trust me, I get it. So. Oh, yeah. Well, you know, in Canada, it’s average of 5 point, 5.4 years to diagnosis.

Worldwide, it’s, 8.6 years. And so, you know, what other disease process makes people wait- So long … that long just to get a diagnosis? So we know that, that, we need to replace- surgery with some other form of diagnosis for endometriosis and ENDOSURE being a tier one test. It’s very simple. It works in all ages and all stages of disease, and noninvasively.

So, we would love to see ENDOSURE or this EVG technology replacing surgery as, the diagnosis, a diagnostic standard of care. I wanted to talk about, [00:12:00] Endometriosis and what this disease really means to women. Mm-hmm. So endometriosis is a chronic inflammatory, highly inflammatory disease that affects the whole body, really.

It affects the reproductive system, the immune system, the, gastrointestinal tract, the nervous system. It affects mental health. It affects the urinary tract system. I actually had one young woman in her 20s, she was on 30 antibiotics before she came to me, and said, “I…” You know, a- actually, it was her mother.

She said, “We don’t know what to do with her, that the doctors and the gynecologists just keep putting her on antibiotics and nothing’s working and, and she’s having these awful symptoms.” And I said, “Well, do an ENDOSURE test.” Mm-hmm. Well, she was positive for it. So, I was hoping that you might be able to elaborate a little bit with people about what your experience was with symptoms of the disease.

We often think about endometriosis being just painful periods, but it can be so much more. So could you tell us about your experience with that and how it impacted your life from work to school- to finances to, social activities, sports, travel? Sure. So I remember… So I’d been on birth control since I was 17, and when I came off of it at 25, I remember being like, “Why are my periods so painful?”

I, I- Mm … remember be- like, when I was a teenager and I was like, “I don’t remember it being like this. Like, what changed?” Like, instantly when you came off, I was like, “Something’s different,” but, I didn’t know what it was. And as these periods continue to happen, I’m like, “Why am I in the fetal position on the couch, popping Tylenol like it’s going out of style with a heating pad just praying that it’s over?

I would take he- heating packs to work with me because that was the only way that I could get through the day. For me, I, I feel like I was lucky in that, I only had really, really bad pain for about eight hours of my period.

After the first day was over, it usually subsided, but those eight hours, depending on when it hit during the week or during the day, I’m either missing work, I’m not sleeping at night because I, I… You can’t sleep. Calling in sick for work. It, it’s debilitating. It really is debilitating. I don’t, I really don’t know if people truly understand the pain.

It’s, it’s a whole nother level. It really is a whole nother level, and where my endometriosis lesions were, um, for me, that was where the pain was. So, um, to have bowel pain, [00:15:00] how do you explain that to somebody? Like, it just … My, my bowels hurt, and I … There’s no way you can put heat on that area. There’s no way to really soothe the- that area.

Um, yeah, that, uh, it was not- It was not pleasant- Yeah, no … at all. And, and so women are hiding these diseases. They go to work, they play sports, they go to school, and they’re hiding what they’re going through. And this tremendous burden that they are carrying is invisible to everybody else. And you know, when you mention these bowel symptoms, there are so many women with what is called IBS- Mm-hmm

that go into their doctor and they say, “You know, my, my stomach doesn’t feel right. I have these cramps.” And you know, it’s just sort of glossed over that, “Oh, yeah, well, that’s nothing,” or, “It’s, it’s just an irritable bowel.” But one of the things with the ENDOSURE, test that we know about is that when endometriosis lesions, produce prostaglandins in very high amounts, these actually cause a seizure-like spasm in the bowels, in, in the smooth muscle of, the small bowel.

And this electrical, fingerprint, it’s actually got a name. It’s a GIMA biomarker, or gastrointestinal myoelectric activity biomarker. This fingerprint is very precise for the diagnosis of endometriosis. It’s over 99% accurate. And when women experience this, they, they know, that something isn’t right.

And I, I think that’s what we try to do in restorative fertility or, also sometimes called restorative reproductive medicine, is that we’re trying to look at the underlying factors and ask questions. If the woman is noticing these symptoms, even if it seems normal to us or like nothing, she knows her body better than anybody else.

If she’s noticing things in her fertility tracking, if she’s noticing things that, are, are symptoms that are recurring every month or, or are, are happening all month long, these are reasons for us as clinicians to listen to women. Because what they’re saying is valid. Mm-hmm. And so many women unfortunately get dismissed or, Or are, ridiculed for the symptoms.

“Oh, put up with it, it’s just a woman’s problem. You know, having pain every month, that’s, you know, that’s just part of being a woman.” How many of my patients have I heard that from? So, I am glad that you [00:18:00] persevered and kept looking for answers and didn’t give up. One other thing that you just brought up was about the birth control pill.

This is a very common staple of treatment for women with dysmenorrhea, or painful periods. And while it masks the symptoms, in your case you weren’t using it for that, so they weren’t using it, for your pain. But as a treatment, it’s given to many women. It obviously worked for you. You didn’t have that pain.

But what we know is that the birth control pill does not cause regression of the disease. The birth control pill actually and, and unfortunately allows for endometriosis to keep advancing in its stage and becoming more complex. So there are better treatment options out there for women who have endometriosis, from a medical perspective.

And they can regress the disease in many cases, they can remove the symptoms, and help women to have normal lives again to some degree, with, you know, active daily living, back in their control. So- We need to have better care for women. We need to be listening to what they are telling us. We need to get them on treatments that are helping alleviate their symptoms.

If they aren’t responsive to treatment, then looking at surgery for some of those. In cases where there’s infertility involved, that surgical decision may come even sooner. Because although medical treatment and restoring fertility, from a hormonal perspective can help to achieve pregnancy, it’s not always effective.

And in your case with, with me, that was one of the things that had been tried for six to seven months, that there was, medical treatment involved and restoring the system back to normal, but it, it didn’t seem to be enough, to get you to achieving pregnancy. So naturally, surgery is the next best, best, step.

What would you tell somebody right now who had these types of symptoms or concerns like yours? What would be your advice to them? Oh, get the testing. Don’t wait. Don’t wait. If I coulda done this seven years ago, I woulda jumped on that train as fast as I could have. I, I wish it existed back then. I really do.

So much heartache, so many tears, so much praying to doctors that something was wrong and being dis- Like, there’s so many things that I would have not had to go through if I could have just had the testing done sooner. If that… It’s, it is a [00:21:00] key to unlock whatever you want it to unlock.

Like, if you want it to have the surgery, now you have answers. If you don’t, th- that’s fine too, but it’s something, you’re finally getting diagnosed. Truthfully, that was the first time I’d ever been told, “Yes, Ashley, you have endometriosis. It’s not suspected anymore. It’s guaranteed. And what you do with that is entirely up to you, but now you have something that you can show a doctor.

I’m not joking. I would like you to listen to me because this, this is the proof.” And to be honest, I showed my family doctor the testing afterwards, and he still doesn’t think I have endometriosis. I haven’t been back since having the surgery that proved it. But there’s something about doctors when they get something in their minds that, “No, I’ve told you you don’t have this,” they, they’re s- they’re stuck in their ways.

But if it’s something that you… It’s, it’s such a tool, and it’s such a key to success for, at least for our story. And, without that testing, I don’t know if, if surgery would’ve been an option. I’m not sure. Here in Alberta, I’m not sure if my doctor would’ve ever put me on a list for surgery. I’m not sure.

Um, but the surgeon in Vancouver saw the, the results, and that was the… That’s all he needed. So it was definitely- Wow … the key to success. So what you’re saying is really that women deserve the choice to make for themselves- 100%. 100%. And then they can, they can proceed with the options that work for them, and really, that’s what patient-centered care is all about.

It’s about discussing options with the patients, making choices, hel- helping them to make the choice, so that they can move forward with their lives and, and, and this is a, a missing step. One of the beautiful things about, this EVG or ENDOSURE test is that it doesn’t require a referral from your doctor.

So if you go to the doctor and they say, “No, I don’t think you have that,” women can still say, “Well, I’m going to go get this test. It’s a private pay option. I can go get it done. It might be covered on my insurance plan. under a health spending account or whatever it might be. I’m in control.

I can make decisions. I can be diagnosed.” and so I think by giving that option to women, it gives them a huge amount of freedom. And empowerment, really. Like empowerment for your own health. That’s right. And Ashley, you said that this was a covered test under your insurance plan? Um, originally it wasn’t.

So my insurance through my employer, it wasn’t covered. But through my husband’s it, his was a generic fertility testing, so he just made a really good, argument, yeah, to the insurance, and they covered it for us 100%, so…

Excellent. Well, and, and you know, [00:24:00] when we talk about insurance companies covering things like this, what insurance companies like about that is that, hey, now I don’t have to pay for this thing or this thing or this drug or- Yeah … this physiotherapy service. It saves them money when insurance companies- Huge

And so having a diagnostic test that can rule that out, you know, when we think about healthcare costs, it costs annually Canada billions of dollars, to handle endometriosis patients. If we can push back the time to diagnosis by five years, we can, we can save 37% of healthcare costs.

It’s, two and a half billion dollars actually to annual healthcare costs. That’s a big number. Remember, it’s in one in four women. Endometriosis is not in… We always thought it was one in 10 women based on outdated statistics but now we know it is closer to the one in four, and that makes sense to me.

As a clinician, I see at least one in four of my patients with endometriosis, and now I know it because of ENDOSURE. But these costs to our healthcare system are immense. It’s over 10 visits that women have to make to healthcare providers, whether it’s their family doctor, a specialist. Think about the diagnostic imaging costs.

Think about the ER visits, for pain. All of those things can go away if they just get an earlier diagnosis. And earlier treatment, we can prevent the progression of the disease. We can prevent the advanced disease from occurring. And then reduce those complications that women have to endure.

Imagine the lives if, if we can get this tier one technology brought in and more women having access to it. Imagine we may live in a world like with smallpox disappearing, through the vaccines that were available for smallpox, it disappeared. We eradicated it. What if we could eradicate or evict endometriosis by detecting it early?

That’s the goal, From a nursing perspective, what does that mean to you when you can think about helping women, to, to take away this disease process from them so that they don’t have that later in life? as a nurse- Mm-hmm

with that background, how would that make you feel professionally? Oh, I feel [00:27:00] like we’re finally being able to empower ourselves to do something that we should have always had access to. Like, I don’t know why it’s so hard for women’s health to be taken seriously. I don’t know why it’s such an uphill battle.

It doesn’t really matter what the disease is. It’s an uphill battle for women. So to have something that is concrete, and the healthcare system loves concrete evidence that something exists. That’s right. So if we can do that for women and avoid so much heartache and pain and whatever that looks like for their journey, all the power to them.

Like, we are talking about such a re- oh my gosh. It, it, it’s a reduction in s-

It’s, it’s just very exciting because we don’t usually have this kind of tool at our disposal, um, that is answers right when you need them. Like, we don’t… There- it doesn’t exist, right? For women’s health, it doesn’t exist. To be able to go get a test and have the answers same day within 20 minutes of a test, and it can tell you whether or not you have a disease or not that you think you probably have, but you didn’t know, how empowering is that?

And then I feel like based on that, as more and more physicians learn about this and the medical field learns about this, you don’t have to try and convince your doctor afterwards that this test was true. They’re gonna know, “Oh, you took that test. Oh, you know… Oh, that’s amazing. Okay, what, what do you wanna do with those results?”

It’s not an uphill battle. You’re right. And, and I think to a large degree, clinicians are saying, “This is too good to be true. It can’t be possible. We’ve been doing surgery to diagnose endometriosis forever.” Exactly. You know, th- this is the way to do it.

there is imaging technology that is in existence right now. It’s the tier two imaging, diagnostic imaging, and that is specifically the, transvaginal ultrasound or MRI for, endometriosis. And of course, both of those require highly specialized physicians to run them. This is advanced, very, very pricey and expensive technology that’s required.

And in terms of the, the transvaginal ultrasound, takes one to one and a half hours to conduct this test, and the training, the sonographer is the physician who has to have the advanced training in order to diagnose the endometriosis with this procedure. Uh, also very, um, uncomfortable and painful to women who have those [00:30:00] lesions in there.

That is one thing I think that clinicians don’t realize if, if they are referred for an ultrasound, if they give them, the patient, the requisition, “Yeah, go in and get an ultrasound. Let’s take a look,” they don’t realize that these patients can have a lot of pelvic pain to begin with. And to use an ultrasound probe intravaginally could really put them through the roof and put them in a great deal of discomfort, and they’re not receiving informed consent for that before they go in for the procedure.

But one of the, the other important parts besides it being, a procedure that isn’t really, ideal for young women, for teens, for obvious reasons, and also there’s a lot of cultures or ethnicities where they don’t want young women or even adult women to have a transvaginal ultrasound being done but the other concern is that MRI and the transvaginal ultrasound will miss 85% of endometriosis cases, because it’s early stage.

And this happens, and then they get misdiagnosed, or the… And when the doctors see the report, they’ll say, “Well, you know, you don’t have endometriosis. We can see that it’s negative. So yeah, it could be all in your head.” And I can attest to that. Um, it’s something, it’s something else.

You did. So- I had three or four ultrasounds and, and never showed any lesions. Right. So yeah, you’re, you’re one of those people where, you know, the early stage disease, it was stage two. It goes all the way up to stage four. So they had detected it or found it surgically in you when it was stage two.

That definitely may have been missed on those imaging studies, and that’s why we don’t use imaging studies to rule out endometriosis. So there’s a lot of education of our healthcare professionals that has to happen. The training and education in this field needs to occur. In fact, one other thing that occurred to me was that there are women who have silent endometriosis.

So s- some women may not have symptoms at all. I did have one patient like that. She was, struggling with achieving pregnancy. She had one previously, but then she began to miscarry, and then she wasn’t getting pregnant at all. And so I recommended the ENDOSURE test to her. It was positive. She had no symptoms of it at all, which is why I never really suspected it, and her doctor never suspected it.

But what, what, relief it gave her to know what was underlying. And guess what? S- she became pregnant six months after surgery as well So, she had, the same thing. She had stage two endometriosis. And, once removed, [00:33:00] she felt like she got her life back. She felt normal again. She… Actually, one of the main symptoms she had were migraine headaches.

Mm. And she always thought the migraines were related to her blood sugar levels or other things, so she tried the lifestyle changes, she tried the diet changes, the exercise changes, reducing stress in her life, which are all great things when it comes to endometriosis. With endometriosis being such a highly inflammatory disease, getting a grip on those things like, insulin resistance, exercise, anti-inflammatory diets, those are all great things to reduce the inflammation and, and the impact On, achieving pregnancy for, proper hormones and proper follicular growth and ovulation.

But it wasn’t enough for her, and once we had exhausted the medical treatment, options, then that’s when we started looking into, endometriosis testing, and it, it was the right decision for her. She had to go out of country to receive surgery because she would’ve had to wait, probably another two to three years in order to get surgery in Alberta.

So thankfully, she also was able to receive, timely care and surgery, and was able to achieve pregnancy. Mm. And, right now she’s about between 25 and 30 weeks along, I think. So, but again, knowing that she had that risk behind her, it gave her that higher level of obstetrical care during her pregnancy, and that reassurance that, “You know what?

I’m being taken care of better now, and I’m less at risk to have problems with this, pregnancy or delivery now.” So what are your plans for family-building now- … that you’ve overcome the reason behind the struggles with infertility? What does the future hold for you now? Hopefully a lot more kids.

And maybe some more sleep too. Yes, yes, eventually more sleep. Yeah, we’re in the thick of the newborn stage right now, but you know what? I wouldn’t change it for the world. Probably come January, we’re gonna be trying for another baby, I would say. So, hopefully it doesn’t take seven years like this little guy did, but, definitely more kiddos in our future.

He deserves some siblings, I think so. Oh, nice. Nice. One of your earlier comments just about you knew inside that IVF wasn’t for you, and I have had so many women and couples come to me and say that, that, you know, they wanted to know the answer. They wanted to know why.

Yeah. Why were they struggling with PMS? Why were they struggling with weight [00:36:00] issues? What would you tell women

should they trust themselves when it comes to making these sorts of decisions? And, what should their path look like? Oh, that’s a good question. 100% trust yourself ’cause you know your body better than anybody else does, and when you feel that something’s wrong, I feel like 99% of the time you’re probably onto something.

To, to be honest, I feel like a lot of people, when they’re told, “Well, this is the next logical step,” usually you go that route. L- to I- why we didn’t do IVF and IUI, I couldn’t tell you. I, I, I don’t have a, a solid reason as to why. It was just I knew that I knew that I knew that we don’t know why, so why, why am I trying to throw pasta at the wall and hope that it sticks?

We don’t know what’s going on. Truth- like, why would I throw out all of this money when we don’t know what’s wrong? And I am not somebody who is going to take I don’t know for an answer. That was truthfully my reasoning, is I need more answers. I don’t know where I’m going to find them, and it took me years to find them, but I’m, I will f- I will find an answer.

And I think maybe that’s just who I am, is I’m not going to take no for an answer. I’m a pretty good advocate for my own health, and I feel like especially in women’s health, you have to be a strong advocate for yourself because the medical system will do whatever And if the doctor says no,

That might be the end of your journey. But- Mm-hmm … for me, I wasn’t taking no for an answer. So I just pursued different options, and I wasn’t willing to pursue, a very expensive option for a 50% chance. That wasn’t good enough for me. And actually, many women do fail IVF and IUI because they have underlying issues that if they’re not controlled or treated, they lead to failure of those procedures.

PMOS, previously known as PCOS, endometriosis, th- these are conditions that are highly inflammatory. They, they affect the immune system, and it affects your ability to achieve, but they also affect your ability to continue a pregnancy as well. So we don’t want to recommend procedures that they’re just bound to fail if we’re not finding out what the underlying issues were to begin with.

I think what you’ve said makes a lot of sense. women, women get this ENDOSURE test done. Well, then what do they do with it? So what, what would your response be to something like that? Well, if you’re open for surgery, I, I mean, it changed my life.

It depends, I guess, on what you’re trying to achieve. I feel like for myself, knowing kind of what endometriosis is, I didn’t want that sitting around in my body anymore, regardless if I was trying to get pregnant or [00:39:00] not. To be honest, once I knew that it was in there, that was something that needed to come out.

So that was my thought process. Other people might not want to go under the knife. Maybe that’s something that they’re not interested in. That’s entirely up to you. But I can tell you as someone who has, it was a very simple procedure. I have teeny, tiny scars. You can’t even see them, to be honest.

Recovery was incredibly easy. I was back to feeling myself in a couple days. I don’t regret doing it at all. I actually got to see photos of the lesions afterwards, and seeing that, I’m, I’m very, very happy that that came out of my body. That doesn’t, that doesn’t belong in there, that’s for sure.

So that was, that was my choice. But I don’t regret having the surgery w- at all. I feel like you’re in very good hands, getting it excised- Good … and removed. At least the surgeon that I had, he was absolutely phenomenal. And I- I’m sure there’s many out there. But that, that was just what I would do, Yep

was- Yep … was get it out. And you’re right, not all surgeons are the same. There are different skillsets, that, that surgeons carry, and certainly the ones that I was trained, with, alongside, were pelvioplastic surgeons or pelvic plastic surgeons. And so, there’s always a worry of it re- recurring, but with the right skillset, and the right surgery, that can be extremely min- minimized.

And, so I, I think that with your excision, surgery, that, that is good news, that hopefully that the recurrence rate is going to be extremely low. So essentially what you’re saying is that women deserve to know if they have this or not, and what they decide to do with the results of this test are really up to them.

It’s not up to the healthcare system- 100% … to tell them. Yeah. Well, the last thing I wanna talk about with you is can you share a little bit more about baby Elijah and about- … your experience with pregnancy- Sure … and with the birth? Did you have any difficulties? What did that process look like for you?

I- is… Did everything go as you would’ve expected knowing- Sure … what you went into the pregnancy with? Sure, sure. So it’s funny because, when I tell people the pregnancy journey or when they were asking me when I was pregnant at work, like, “How are you feeling?” And my answer was always the same, I felt great.

I wasn’t sick at all. Um, I had the easiest pregnancy. To be honest, there was days that I would look down, I’m like, “I don’t even feel pregnant.” That was my journey. And to be honest, um, most people was… And the reason they said that is because you’ve been on a hard enough journey already, your pregnancy doesn’t have to be hard.

And that’s kind of what mine felt like, to be honest. It was a breeze. The pregnancy was a [00:42:00] breeze. If that is how pregnancy is going to be for me in the future, I have no fears whatsoever. The birthing experience and labor also was a breeze. The Rocky View staff that I had was absolutely phenomenal.

I cannot say enough good things about it. Um, I was with a midwife team here in Calgary, and, I also have only the utmost respect for what those women do. It was such a fabulous experience, them coming to the house during labor, and then when he was born, them doing wellness checks here at my own house.

Like, it was so lovely. And, he’s almost two months old now. Crazy. Uh, and he’s, he’s perfect. He’s absolutely perfect. And you, as a family, look perfect and so elated and, joyful at his arrival. When you talk about midwives, you know, they have a role to play with ENDOSURE as well, just because, they do have in their purview for women’s health, taking care of women’s health.

But also it has such a, a huge connection, as I mentioned, to pregnancy complications, maternal and fetal morbidity and mortality, and that’s actually something that is A big concern in the medical community right now, they are addressing those further. We know that the WHO, or World Health Organization, has for many years been shining the light on this as being a huge, problem, especially in the third world countries where they don’t have access to surgical diagnosis of endometriosis.

They are, over the moon about the idea of, tier one testing that can be done, noninvasively and, in remote communities or underserved communities. I just wanna, mention, put that plug in, for the midwives because they are so incredibly important. And, and what they can bring to the table and where I think the future of, of ENDOSURE could be heading in.

So, thank you for, for sharing your story from start to finish. we’ve turned that sadness into joy, and gratitude, and gladness. And, I think this is the start of transforming lives for women. 100%. I think this is a watershed moment.

I think that we can make a huge impact with, the electroviscerogram, or EVG ENDOSURE technology that’s a tier one test. We can replace surgical diagnostic, testing, and bring it so that it’s more accessible for women. And thank you, Ashley, for being part of this journey and,

And that ends another episode of Endometriosis A to Z, where we feel knowledge is [00:45:00] power when it comes to managing endometriosis. We’d love to hear from you about topics you want covered. If you have questions, you can email us directly at hello@endodiagnosis.com. Until next time, stay informed, stay hopeful, and keep advocating for your health.

See you in the next episode