In 1960, the US-based pharmaceutical lab G.D. Searle and Company, or Searle, launched Enovid, one of the first oral birth control pills, following approval by the US Food and Drug Administration, or FDA. Prior to Enovid, there were no oral birth control options for women. Women were reliant on male condoms, homemade concoctions, and other contraceptive methods as barriers to provide them with protection against pregnancy. Women’s rights activists like Margaret Sanger aimed to address that gap by supporting the creation a birth control pill. Sanger collaborated with researchers to formulate a hormonal pill that gives women the ability to protect themselves against getting pregnant. Although some steps in the path to creating the pill were unethical by today’s standards, they did result in the creation of an oral birth control pill. Enovid offered a new method of family planning that gave women the ability to control pregnancy and served as a precursor to additional birth control pills, which over 150 million women use worldwide annually.

For women with polyendocrine metabolic ovarian syndrome, or PMOS, combination oral contraceptives are a first-line treatment. PMOS is a reproductive hormonal disorder that affects roughly one in ten women of reproductive age and causes symptoms such as an irregular menstrual cycle and hyperandrogenism, or an excess of male-typical hormones called androgens. Combination oral contraceptives are medications containing a mix of synthetic female hormones that women often use as a means of birth control. In the 1970s, researchers found that the synthetic female hormones in combination oral contraceptives can reduce excess androgens in women experiencing PMOS. Several medical conferences in the 1990s and early 2000s created a diagnostic standard for PMOS, which led to an increase in diagnoses across the world and expanded the number of women who were receiving combined oral contraceptives for PMOS management. By relieving hyperandrogenism, combination oral contraceptives help women manage the symptoms of PMOS and reduce their risk of long-term health problems.