Inside Health

Can you take hormone replacement therapy - HRT - for forever? Three women talk about their different experiences of how they managed the menopause. We balance the risks and the benefits of HRT to see who might be able to take it for the long-term. And do you know how much water should you drink? If you said 2 litres or six-to-eight glasses a day then you may be in for a surprise. PRESENTER: James...

Can “one helluva pig” be the solution to a worldwide shortage of organ donors. People die waiting for replacement hearts, lungs and kidneys. So I meet the teams that have started transplanting pig organs into people. We’ll explore the huge leaps of genetic engineering that are making "xenotransplantation” possible and ask if it’s even ethical to try. Presenter: James Gallagher Producer: Andrew Luc...

Will we need boosters forever? It’s the question you wanted us to tackle so we’re joined by Prof Beate Kampmann, the Director of The Vaccine Centre at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, in the search for answers. Then we explore why so few pregnant women are taking up the Covid vaccine even though it is the best option for mother and baby. And can we stop another infection in babi...

Jimi Olaghere feels like he’s been reborn after a pioneering new treatment for sickle cell disease. Scientists have engineered his blood to overcome the disease that left him in constant pain. I speak to Jimi about his experience and to his doctors about what this could mean for people with sickle cell around the world. Then we explore the headlines around women being worse off with male surgeons...

Are you one of the five million people with asthma in the UK? If so, could you be on a different inhaler - one that could control your asthma better while also being kinder to the planet? “Puffers” - or aerosol spray inhalers - contain potent greenhouse gases and can be tricky to use correctly, so not everyone can control their asthma. We speak to Caroline from Cornwall, who has switched inhalers...

Is an Omicron infection inevitable? Which drugs still work? Is this the last hurrah of the pandemic? This week we have three of the country’s greatest scientific minds teasing apart what Omicron means for our lives now and in the future. Prof Eleanor Riley, Prof Azra Ghani and Prof Sir Martin Landray also tackle your, at times controversial questions! And our regular Dr Rohin Francis gives us a fi...

Happy New Year. I hope you’re sticking to your New Year’s resolutions! Our resident GP Margaret McCartney has dragged me out for a wintery run to discuss how to stick to a healthier lifestyle. And we’re joined by Dr Giles Yeo, Dr Ian Hamiliton and Prof Russel Foster as we tackle the best diets, giving up booze for Dry January and getting a better night’s sleep. PRESENTER: James Gallagher PRODUCER:...

Beat pre-diabetes and get your love life back? We hear from two people who are trying to avoid getting type 2 diabetes. But not everyone thinks the term is helpful so our resident GP Margaret McCartney and Dr Samuel Seidu, from the Leicester Diabetes Centre, join us to discuss. And our cardiologist Rohin Francis gets one step closer to his dream of being an astronaut. Presenter: James Gallagher Pr...

Flying London to New York and back. 244 times every day. For half a year. That’s the size of the carbon footprint of all the personal protective equipment used in health and social care in England during the first six months of the pandemic. So I take a look at how the NHS is going green including efforts to make a reusable facemask. Also, a shortage of vials for blood tests has GP Navjoyt Ladher...

The future is here. Gene silencing medicines - which can fine tune how our DNA works - have held promise for decades. Now hundreds of thousands of people will get them in the UK. James speaks to a surgeon whose life and career have been saved by gene-silencing drugs and to researchers who think the field could lead to drugs for diseases we think of as untreatable. Presenter: James Gallagher Produc...

The pandemic has strapped rocket boosters onto vaccine science. So where is it taking us next? What other diseases are we about to take on? Prof Dame Sarah Gilbert, architect of the Oxford vaccine, gives me her view. Also, given teenagers and parents agree about everything and never have any arguments.... we should be able to rapidly resolve any questions about whose decision it is when it comes t...

Anyone need a hug? I’m taking a look at this year’s Nobel Prize for Medicine. It helps explain how we experience the physical sensations of touch, heat and cold. Yes it’s the hugs, tea and ice cream Nobel! But it could also have implications for treating pain, so Prof Irene Tracey is here to discuss. And you wait decades for fortification and two come along at once. I explore why the government wa...

We’re going meat-free for this podcast! The supermarket shelves are heaving with faux meats and vegan ultra-processed foods. And if you don’t want to put milk in your coffee or on your cereals there’s a load of plant-based alternatives. So we take a look at how healthy these foods are and what you need to know when you’re doing the weekly shop. Sorry you will have to listen to me eating a sausage...

Do you know your mons pubis from your labia majora? Few of us can identify the parts of the vulva - that’s the external female genitals. So I go exploring with Dr Fiona Reid from St Mary’s Hospital in Manchester and find out why we all need to be better informed. Also, who should be able to look at your medical records? There are grand plans afoot to collect the data your GP holds on you and make...

My blood pressure is perfectly normal, but could I benefit from medication to lower it even further? We discuss with Oxford University’s Prof Kazem Rahimi and our resident GP Margaret McCartney. How do you diagnose a new disease that could have 200 symptoms? We explore long Covid in children with our reporter Carolyn Atkinson and Professor Sir Terence Stephenson from the UCL Great Ormond Street In...

It’s time to talk about periods and contraception. Different birth control options alter the menstrual cycle. Journalist Nicola Davis tells me about her decade without periods and our resident GP Margaret McCartney and sexual health doctor Julia Bailey discuss the evidence and what you need to know. We’ve also got vaccination expert Adam Finn to discuss the slowdown in young people getting the Cov...

Time for a sprinkling of happiness with a new exhibition at the Wellcome Collection. Last time we heard how children's A&E is under huge pressure as infections, that disappeared during Covid, make a comeback. But doctors also warn that many of those children shouldn’t actually be there. Damian Roland a paediatrician in emergency medicine at University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust busts the...

Here at Team Inside Health we’ve noticed our children are constantly ill. So we find out why. Are all those bugs that were dormant for the pandemic suddenly having a resurgence? Or has a year and a half of being squeaky clean left a lingering impact on our immune system? Plus Medlife Crisis - Rohin Frances asks can you be too fit?

The Inside Health podcast is back with a bang! Find out how having a couple of mates round for the football trapped scientist Alex Crozier inside a Covid experiment. Laura talks us through her remarkable journey, from a fear of needles to having her Covid jab, and Oxford University’s Daniel Freeman has some tips for you too. We’ve unleashed our cardiologist, Rohin Francis, for the first of his “Ro...

This is the remarkable story of how the UK’s Recovery Trial saved the lives of hundreds of thousands of Covid patients. It was set up in nine days, after a conversation on the number 18 bus. Within 100 days it had found the first life-saving drug. This trial has united thousands of doctors, the NHS and 40,000 patients, at the scariest moments of their lives, changing the pandemic, and possibly med...

I was floored for three days with side-effects after having my first Covid jab and many of you have been in touch about your side-effects too. Why do some of us feel awful after the vaccine, while others barely notice anything? What does this say about our immune systems and how protected we will be against covid? We put your questions to Eleanor Riley, a professor of immunology and infectious dis...

I have become hooked on playing online chess during this lockdown and after watching the Queen’s Gambit. So we’ll find out if it is actually doing my brain any good and whether it and similar games can ward off dementia. Margaret McCartney takes us on a fascinating tour through the history of deliberately infecting people with diseases, as the first “challenge trials” with coronavirus are about to...

What has the pandemic done to our sex lives? We’ll hear if there’s been a baby boom with Dr Margaret McCartney and Dr Rebecca Thomson-Glover has the lowdown on sexually transmitted infections. We’ll also explore changes to contraception and sexual health services. Meanwhile it feels like we’re on the march to normality, but what about the backlog of patients whose treatment has been cancelled. We...

Most people recover rapidly after catching coronavirus. But I chat to three people who were infected almost a year ago and are still feeling the impact, both on their bodies and their minds. Doctors are having to rapidly grapple with how to treat patients with long Covid. We speak to one of them, Dr Manoj Sivan, the Research Lead for the Long Covid Service in Leeds, who warns that long Covid could...

A fever, cough or loss of smell and taste are criteria for a Covid-19 test, but what if you have different symptoms? James Gallagher discusses whether more symptoms should be added to the UK government's list with resident GP, Margaret McCartney and Dr Thomas Struyf of KU Leuven. Cardiologist Dr Rohin Francis explains what symptoms he sees when patients with coronavirus arrive in hospital. One of...