Everyday Medicine with Dr Luke

As a background to this podcast in 2021 there were 15 200 Australians with kidney failure receiving dialysis, a doubling of the number receiving dialysis from 2000 with a male-to-female ratio of approximately 2 to 1.  82% of these patients were receiving chronic haemodialysis all of whom required an arterio venous vascular shunt for access. A small proportion (18%) were being managed by peritoneal...

Show Notes: Snake Bite Envenomation in Australia with Dr Tim Jackson  Australia is home to many of the world’s most dangerous snake species so familiarity with snake bite management and understanding the clinical effects of snake bite is vital for Australian doctors, especially those with a rural practice. Each year in Australia there are about 1000 recorded snake bites but fortunately only 2-3 de...

Episode 162 Show Notes. Medical Outreach Programs with Sister Jodie Manssen In this episode, we sit down with the inspiring Sister Jodie Manssen , an expert ICU and emergency nurse, adventurer, and philanthropist, whose journey exemplifies compassion and dedication. In 2023, Jodie self-funded and volunteered with TrekMedic , a Melbourne-based nonprofit comprised of volunteer doctors, nurses, and a...

Michael Kenihan is nothing short of a legend in the Australian allied health community. Over four decades, he has made remarkable contributions as a sports physiotherapist, business manager, sports administrator, entrepreneur, coach, and thought leader in health and sports medicine. A fellow of Sports Medicine Australia, Michael has led Australia’s largest allied health network, Life Care, navigat...

Motor neuron disease (MND) is a rare group of neurodegenerative disorders causing motor nerves in the brain and spine to lose function over time. It affects approximately 2,000 Australians (1 in 11,000), with two new diagnoses daily and a 1:300 lifetime risk. MND is more common in males (60%) than females (40%), particularly those aged 75–84. While 10% of cases have a hereditary cause, the genetic...

Exploring Parkinson's Disease with Associate Professor Ernie Butler In this episode, we dive into Parkinson’s Disease (PD), a progressive neurodegenerative disorder that primarily impacts dopamine-producing neurons in the substantia nigra, leading to motor and non-motor symptoms. Our guest, Associate Professor Ernie Butler, consultant neurologist and founder of Frankston Neurology Group, provides...

It’s difficult to walk through an old-growth natural forest anywhere in the world and not feel awe and a connection to the majesty of our beautifully stunning Earth, however, when these amazing ecosystems burn as forest fires the consequence has devastating outcomes for affected communities. In recent times in Australia the Ash Wednesday fires of 1983 claimed 75 lives, The Black Saturday Fires of...

Globus, a persistent or intermittent sensation of a lump or foreign body in the throat, is a well-defined clinical symptom. Though it is non-painful, it can be long-lasting, difficult to treat, and prone to recurrence. Interestingly, this sensation often improves with eating and typically does not accompany dysphagia (difficulty swallowing) or odynophagia (painful swallowing). Globus is a common c...

Approximately 1 in 10 adults will experience pain or discomfort in the mid-facial region, with a higher prevalence among females and young adults. Understandably, many patients attribute this pain to sinus issues, given the proximity of the sinuses to the face. However, nasal endoscopy and CT scans have shown that chronic sinus infections are not as common a cause of facial pain as one might think...

Rhinitis, Sinusitis, and Rhinosinusitis are common conditions frequently seen in primary care. Studies indicate that 1.4 out of every 100 general practice encounters involve acute or chronic sinusitis, and over 2 million Australians are estimated to suffer from chronic rhinosinusitis. In some studies, this condition has shown a greater impact on social functioning than chronic heart failure, angin...

In an earlier episode titled Breathing we had the privilege to explore heathy breathing patterns and the Bohr effect which governs oxygen delivery to tissues with physiotherapist and breathing expert Allan Abbott, if you haven’t had an opportunity to listen to that podcast, I recommend it as an introduction to the subject we are covering today. Allan has been exploring breathing techniques to enha...

In an earlier episode titled 'Breathing' we had the privilege to explore heathy breathing patterns and the Bohr effect which governs oxygen delivery to tissues with physiotherapist and breathing expert Allan Abbott, if you haven’t had an opportunity to listen to that podcast, I recommend it as an introduction to the subject we are covering today.  Allan has been exploring breathing techniq...

Amyloidosis is a group of diseases in which abnormal proteins known as amyloid fibrils build up in various tissues including the kidney, heart, liver, skin, and nervous system resulting in a variety of clinical sequelae including organ dysfunction and death. There are over 23 unrelated proteins known to form amyloid fibrils, many of which are aggregates of misfolded proteins that are neither biode...

The use of faecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) to treat severe C. Difficile enterocolitis was visited in episode 14 of Everyday Medicine with Dr Darcy Holt as our guest. If you haven’t had an opportunity to listen to that conversation, please do and hopefully it will pique your interest. In this episode we invite a guest involved in active research at Melbourne’s St Vincent’s Hospital to discu...

Primitive single-celled organisms had patches of photoreceptor proteins to detect light. The first eyes, developed over 550 million years ago, are now the second most complex organ after the brain, with over two million working parts and more than a million nerve fibres connecting each eye to the brain via the optic nerves. Unfortunately, many Australians suffer from chronic eye conditions, with o...

An estimated 20% of Australians have an allergic disease, with Melbourne as a hotspot where one in three people experience hay fever and thunderstorm asthma. Allergies can affect the skin, sinuses, airways, gastrointestinal tract, or other organs. Allergies are immune reactions to foreign antigens, causing tissue inflammation and organ dysfunction. Symptoms depend on prior immune response, antigen...

Barrett’s oesophagus is a common condition, named after the Australian born thoracic surgeon Norman Barrett who practised in England and laid the foundation descriptions of this condition but incorrectly concluded the abnormal columnar tissue lining was embryonic in origin due to the presence of a congenitally shortened oesophagus leading to a tubular portion of stomach being trapped in the chest....

The advent of complex therapies including biologics and small molecules has provided a new paradigm for the treatment of many immune mediated inflammatory conditions notably in rheumatology, gastroenterology (Inflammatory Bowel Disease) and also in dermatology. New dimensions of treatment can now be applied from this amazing therapeutic armamentarium at our disposal. In this podcast we will turn o...

Neurosurgeon Rondhir Jithoo has led an extraordinary life, growing up in South Africa with a medical father and deeply thinking anthropologist mother. He obtained his medical degree from the Nelson Mandela School of Medicine at the University of Natal and trained in neurosurgery at South Africa’s Wentworth Hospital where he received the Registrars Prize from the South African Society of Neurosurge...

The health and welfare workforces deliver diverse services through many private and public organisations. Combined these services employ more than 1 million people of which there were more than 642 000 health practitioners working in their registered professions in Australia in 2020. This included 105 300 medical practitioners, 350,000 nurses and midwives, 21,500 dental practitioners and 166,000 a...

Clinical problems related to the integument are very common and contribute up to 15% of all general practitioner presentations. Humans are predisposed to a multitude of skin diseases ranging from acne and atopic dermatitis to psoriasis, autoimmune diseases such as SLE, vasculitis, skin cancers, viral exanthems, drug eruptions and external manifestations of internal disease - which in the gastroent...

Clinical problems related to the integument are very common and contribute up to 15% of all general practitioner presentations. Humans are predisposed to a multitude of skin diseases ranging from acne and atopic dermatitis to psoriasis, autoimmune diseases such as SLE, vasculitis, skin cancers, viral exanthems, drug eruptions and external manifestations of internal disease - which in the gastroent...

From the RACGP Health of the Nation report; depression, anxiety, and sleep disturbances are amongst the most commonly seen presentations of mental disorders in general practice. About 1 in 8 people in the world live with a mental disorder which often involves significant disturbances in thinking, emotional regulation, or behaviour.  Globally it is estimated that 5% of adults suffer from depression...

From the RACGP Health of the Nation report; depression, anxiety, and sleep disturbances are amongst the most commonly seen presentations of mental disorders in general practice. About 1 in 8 people in the world live with a mental disorder which often involves significant disturbances in thinking, emotional regulation, or behaviour.  Globally it is estimated that 5% of adults suffer from depression...

Over the past decade there has been an emergence of literature pointing to potential clinical benefits for a range of disease states through the adoption of slow breathing techniques. The popularity worldwide of the Wim Hof method adopted from eastern techniques has done much to pique interest.  Notably the belief and practice of controlling one’s breath to both restore and enhance health is not n...