PHOTOGRAPH: NETFLIX


PHOTOGRAPH: SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY


WHAT ARE WE LOOKING AT? Bone marrow SEM


www.mddus.com OUT THERE


POO-POO TO STOOLS It’s out with the stool and in with the poo at the nhs.uk website. Content designers have revealed the words and phrases they say are easiest for users to understand. Peeing and pooing is favoured over urinating and bowel movements, while “water tablets” are now “tablets that make you pee more” and stools are something you sit on. Read the full list at tinyurl.com/yyx9pzxs


TAEKWONDOCS A group of junior doctors in India’s NRS Hospital have earned taekwondo black belts following a rise in attacks by patients and relatives. While they have since reported a reduction in violent incidents, campaigners are calling for broader measures such as increased government healthcare spending.


IN GOOP HEALTH Actress/lifestyle guru Gwyneth Paltrow brought sound baths, liquid gold lattes and alkaline water to London for her inaugural UK-based wellness summit recently. For just £1,000 a ticket, guests mingled with celebs like Penelope Cruz and enjoyed the alleged health benefits of dance cardio, “visualisation toolkits” and other plant-based goodies.


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Pick: Netflix - Mothers on the Edge WHAT ARE WE LOOKING AT?


Stumped? The answer is at the bottom of the page


Directed by Mark Casebow. Written by Louis Theroux for the BBC.


AWARD-WINNING documentary maker Louis Theroux shines a spotlight on postpartum mental illness in women. In this one-hour standalone show he visits two specialist psychiatric units in England and speaks to women being treated for a range


of conditions, from anxiety to psychosis, while living with their babies.


Among those is Barbara, who


attempted suicide while in the grip of postpartum psychosis. She tells Theroux she fears her husband might be her baby’s brother as well as father. Catherine, meanwhile, takes beautiful care of baby Jake yet feels no bond with him. She was


sectioned after attempting suicide and tells Theroux she feels her son “deserves better than me”. These are just two of the


heartbreaking and profoundly affecting stories told in this fascinating, important programme. Theroux certainly deserves


credit for broaching a subject that has had little media attention.


Book Review: Heart: A history


by Sandeep Jauhar Oneworld Publications, £9.99, 2019


Review by Dr Greg Dollman


HEART is the story of what Sandeep Jauhar describes as the engine of life. The cardiologist chronicles medicine’s quest to understand how the heart works (and how to fix it when it is ‘broken’) while considering how we “can most wisely live with – as well as by – our hearts”. Understandably, therefore, the book is a mix of science (including


fascinating facts: heparin was discovered in the brains of salamanders, and “from birth until death, [the heart] beats nearly three billion times”) and philosophy (“if the heart bestows life and death, it also instigates metaphor”, which exist across cultures). And Jauhar considers the two against a backdrop of his personal stories ‘of the heart’. Heart will inevitably trigger memories of years spent in medical school laboratories and lecture theatres, as well as the patients you have met over the years. Jauhar gives the backstory to eponyms (like Osler and Billroth), and shares his own clinical experiences to complement


the theory. His chapters (named to describe the heart’s function in


lay terms, including ‘dynamo’, ‘pipes’ and ‘wires’) cleverly dissect the organ into its basic parts. These provide a helpful refresher on the heart’s anatomy and physiology. Jauhar also charts medics’ understanding of the heart as


a pump, noting that historically cultural fallacies limited progress. Those who dared to question the working of the heart risked their reputations and even their lives for disrespecting or challenging its sanctity. And some, like George Mines, paid the ultimate sacrifice as a result of self-experimentation. Historians believe that Mines, who


discovered the electrophysiology phenomenon ‘re-entry’, died while exploring the ‘vulnerable period’ for arrhythmias in a healthy heart. Besides tracing the giant steps taken by clinicians and researchers to


replicate the heart’s function (the development of the heart-lung machine and the defibrillator), Heart also considers intertwined issues like medical paternalism, autonomy and consent. Jauhar quotes pioneering cardiac surgeon C. Walton Lillehei as saying:


“You don’t venture into a wilderness expecting to find a paved road”. Society is indebted to so many dedicated clinicians who had the courage (and audacity) to probe further and deeper to unlock the mysteries of the heart. And Jauhar’s book is a neatly paved road that makes for an enjoyable journey through this wilderness.


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