Where can I buy disposable applicators for Ovestin?

[Tripur]

The reusable one has so many ridges and corners and with my shit presbyopic eyes I'm not confident that I'm cleaning all the white cream off all the white nooks and crannies. I really don't want to give my ageing fanny a dose of BV on top of all the other peri indignities she has to face so could do with disposable applicators. Where can you buy these please?

Ahem. I used to just wipe the outside of mine with a piece of toilet paper. I tried washing inside but it's too hard to get it all off. The only way I think it would truly be clean is to sterilise it.

That said I'm using it liberally and daily now under a consultant and I squeeze a quarter of a tube onto my hand and then rub all over the perineum and labia and stick the rest inside with my finger.

So you could move to using your finger instead?

It's working OK that way for me.

I have no idea if you can buy them in ref to your original question!

Have you tried amazon?

Thank you. I guess I could try that but it would be hard to measure. I've looked on Amazon and googled and I can only find applicators for suppositories (I think - description and pictures not clear to me at least) which is a bit different.

I finally found a use for the teapot spout brush that had been rattling around for years in the Drawer of Doom. It's perfect for cleaning inside the tube of the applicator, and gets into all the ridges of the plunger.

Disposable isn't great even if they exist as it's just dumping more plastic.

Can't you just wash it under the tap -running warm water - and dry with a tissue? That works. And unless you've got an infection, it's not contaminated with anything.

@Tripur You know you can take it apart - the two halves ? Pull the plunger out and wash the two halves separately.

Buy a brush set intended for cleaning reusable drinking straws.
A very narrow version of a bottle brush.
They work great for cleaning the applicators.

Use a Tepe interdental brush as a mini bottle brush

If you separate the 2 parts of the applicator there's no problem.

It's perfectly easy to wash the end where the cream goes and you can let the water from a tap run right through it, and just wipe away any cream.

Then do the same with the other end- the plunger- and then put them back together.

I do separate it but my near vision isn't great and everything is white and full of ridges so it's difficult for me to see if I've cleaned it properly. As with so many things that make life easier, you can buy disposable ones in the USA.

I just take it apart, wash it as best I can and do not give it another thought. I guess it is not perfectly clean, but doubt my fanny is either 😂

I’ve given up worrying, just a wipe outside and that’s it. Vag is still hugely grateful for it (as is my brain and every part of DH).

You could use the applicator to draw up the right amount and then squeeze it onto your finger and apply it yourself? I doubt it’s an exact dose and I guess you’d get your eye in to the right amount pretty quickly.

I used to use a baby toothbrush or an interdental brush to clean the ridge parts that screw on to the tube. It's a stupid design of an applicator though.

To be blunt, your vagina is perfectly clean! Nothing awful will happen if some cream is left in it, but wiping and rinsing the applicator should do the job.

Just wipe the applicator end with a tissue (you can get a tissue inside it) and rinse it under the tap using water that's hot but not boiling.

I don't think adding more plastic to landfills is making life easier (for us in the long term.) Sorry!

They’re disgusting. I got my Dr to prescribe Vagifem, they are pre loaded applicators, they will cost the NHS more but my Fanny deserves it! I have enough to put up with without a shitty applicator that’s bloody hard to clean, gross 🤮 I put the empty applicators in the recycle bin.

The inside of the applicator never touches anything except the cream from the tube. It's only the outside that touches you. So you don't really need to clean the inside.
That said I sometimes clean mine in hot water by rapidly pumping the plunger up and down to flush out residual cream. Only a minute amount is left in the nooks and crannies.
It's an incredibly stupid design. Not designed for comfort, ease of cleaning or ease of anything else.

The design is so the applicator can be screwed onto the tube for each application when you fill it (and the threads on each interlock.)

I guess they assumed that would be easier than holding the applicator with one hand and squeezing the tube with the other hand.

I never bother doing that and expect no one else does.

I know some women here have complained about the waste with plastic for Vagifem and there may be a version (different brand name?) that uses paper applicators or ones that can be reused?)

Great, thanks @Snippit , I'll do the same. Like you say life is tough enough without worrying about mouldy old bits of bloody cream.

If your applicator is shitty you are putting it in the wrong place!

Right ok I use the syringe which was intended for my dogs medicine! It's like a calpol one. It's smoother and thinner and much better. You can draw it out easily. Just don't tell my dog 😉 😂

@ChimneyPot it is a horrible applicator! The ridges get stuck and it is not a smooth insertion. Maybe I have a bobbly vagina 🤦🏻‍♀️

i also use vagifem as well

Boiling water does the trick. Soak in boiling water for 10 mins in a jam jar then rinse with boiling water a few times.
Sparkly clean and sterilised

It's rank! And if you do it at bedtime where do you put it down? I'm going to try fingers, great idea

Ok that's like the clingfilm packet trick. Who knew!

Infections happen when germs from one place are introduced to another place. Bum germs are harmless on the bum. Nose germs are harmless in the nose. Vag germs aren’t weaponised by being outside the body on the applicator for a few hours. The applicator is going back where it came from. What’s the risk?

Well yeah I guess why wash anything? You can just wear the same pair of knickers forever.