Balance – Menopause Support app

The free version of the app includes:

• Education on menopause with a wide variety of evidence-based articles.
• Ability to track your symptoms – including periods, sleep, activities, mood, sleep, exercise, nutrition. The scale for symptoms is from ‘not at all' to 'extremely' which translates into a percentage score which is then compared with other journal entries.
• Questionnaires track symptoms every 3 months, and the app has built-in reminders for users to complete these.
• My health is a section where users can view 1, 3 or 6-month graphs of their symptoms. A health report can also be generated, which can be shared with health professionals (this includes data from tracking and questionnaires).
• Experiments is a section where there are suggested tasks to try to improve wellbeing, (eg, eating fish oil for 15 days to try and improve hot-flushes). It's is openly stated that they may not work for everyone, but generally these experiments are based on improving general health.
• A meditation timer is available in the journal section, which gives prompts on inhale, hold, exhale, hold.
• An online community of users, allowing advice and support.

The premium membership (at a cost) includes:

• Live sessions with Dr Newson (GP and menopause specialist).
• Expertise shared by ‘balance+ gurus’ on a range of topics related to menopause.
• Videos with more information on menopause.
• Pilates, yoga, meditation sessions and recipe-videos.

For the complete app description, go to the app website(external link), Google Play(external link), App Store(external link) or, for a more detailed review, see reviews below.

Clinical review

Reviewer: Dr Phoebe Hunt, Medical Officer working in Sexual and Reproductive Health, Magma Healthcare
Date of review: August 2023
Platform: Apple
Version: 1.7.0
Comments: I think overall this app is very good. It has a wide variety of clearly-laid out and practical information in the free version. The symptom-tracking functions are quite comprehensive and data can be collected and collated for sharing with health professionals.
Of note, the Balance app developer website (www.balance-menopause.com/balance-app/) has menopause libraries with videos/audio files/articles in different languages (English, Hindi, French, Spanish, Norwegian) – these are free to access and don’t require an app log-in.
Note: The premium paid version was not reviewed in detail.
Safety concerns: The community section of the app allows users to share personal medical information and other users can comment with advice/support. Although there is a function to ‘report stories’ posted, there may be inappropriate sharing of information/advice given which could be potentially harmful.
When a story is posted, users can also view the profile of the posting user, which includes symptoms they have, which some people may feel uncomfortable with.
For the experiment section, while the suggested ‘experiments’ are aimed to improve general wellbeing (cut out caffeine, increase fibre etc), some of them suggest supplements which could be costly (fish oil, B6, probiotics) and while these may have some (low-level) evidence, there could be a significant cost for no real gain.
New Zealand relevance: Yes – NHS-based, so some advice/information on medications available may not be correct for a New Zealand setting.