Health Check

A research center in Sudan had brought hope for neglected disease mycetoma, we hear from a mycetoma expert how the conflict has affected research. Also on the show, have researchers discovered a genetic form of Alzheimer’s, and for the first time an orangutan is seen making a medicine to treat its own wound – what can this tell us about the history of human medication? Presenter: Claudia Hammond Producer: Margaret Sessa-Hawkins

Claudia Hammond discusses the rise in mental health issues among teenage girls, exploring factors like academic pressures and social media. Researchers and psychologists emphasize the need for systemic approaches and early interventions to support adolescent girls' mental health.

After a number of incidents around the world so far this year that have left dozens of flyers needing hospital treatment, we look at how a rise in air turbulence because of global warming is leading to more and more injuries to passengers.Professor Paul Williams from the University of Reading in the UK tells us why turbulence is so hard to plan for, how new technology might be able to help solve the problem, and how despite an increase in incidents it’s still incredibly rare to experience extreme turbulence./Claudia Hammond is also joined by Monica Lakhanpaul, Professor of Integrated Community Child Health at University College London, to look at how a shortage of HPV vaccines is leading to millions of girls across Africa missing out on receiving the shots.Monica also tells us about her new research on the barriers children with epilepsy are facing being able to exercise.We also explore what it’s like for people that don’t have an inner monologue and can’t imagine sounds – a phenomenon known as anauralia.Presenter: Claudia Hammond Producer: Dan Welsh

After a 50% jump in meningitis cases reported across Africa last year, Nigeria is becoming the first country to roll out a new 5-in-1 meningitis vaccine. The Men5CV vaccine protects people against five strains of the meningococcus bacteria.Claudia Hammond is joined by New Scientist medical journalist Clare Wilson to discuss how it’s hoped the treatment will help significantly reduce cases of the disease.We also head to Brazil to hear how the country is dealing with long Covid, four years after the pandemic.Clare also tells Claudia about the new cancer treatment testing different drugs on thousands of miniature tumours to see which of them works best. The team behind the research at Florida International University in Miami say they hope it could eventually be used routinely for everyone with cancer. We also get a new update from British journalist Mike Powell, as we follow his journey after receiving a kidney transplant.And Claudia and Clare look at how patches of skin grafted onto people receiving lung transplants are being used as a way of spotting organ rejection in a new trial.Image Credit: Martin HarveyPresenter: Claudia Hammond Producer: Dan Welsh

Claudia Hammond presents a special edition of Health Check from the Northern Ireland Science Festival, where she’s joined by a panel of experts to discuss the psychology of hope.With a live audience in Belfast’s Metropolitan Arts Centre, Claudia speaks to Dr Karen Kirby, senior lecturer in psychology at the University of Ulster; Dr Kevin Mitchell, associate professor of genetics and neuroscience at Trinity College Dublin; and author Sinéad Moriarty.Topics include the role of hope in medical scenarios, if we can learn to be hopeful, and how we can hold onto hope in the modern world. We also hear questions from our audience, including whether or not we should all just lower our expectations.Presenter: Claudia Hammond Producer: Dan Welsh

As the recent surge in cases of dengue fever continues across Latin America and the Caribbean, Puerto Rico declares a public health emergency. Claudia Hammond is joined by Professor of Global Health and Epidemiology at Boston University, Matt Fox, to hear how warmer temperatures have lead to outbreaks of the mosquito-borne disease around the world, with millions of cases reported so far this year.We speak to the artist Jason Wilsher-Mills at his latest exhibition inspired by his childhood experiences of disability, and hear the role it played in his journey into the arts.Claudia and Matt discuss the spread of mpox in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, with cases reported in all but 3 of the country’s 26 provinces.We hear from Uganda about the project hoping to help provide essential equipment for safe anaesthesia in children’s surgery. And the study that says just two nights of broken sleep are enough to make us feel years older.Presenter: Claudia Hammond Producer: Dan Welsh

A groundbreaking pig kidney transplant, risks of non-melanoma skin cancer for outdoor workers, the impact of extreme heat on pregnancy outcomes, unregulated sale of traditional medicines on intercity buses in Cameroon, dangers of fake drugs in traditional medicine practices, and debunking claims of intermittent fasting linked to heart-related death risk.

Most people with Covid-19 make a full recovery within 12 weeks, but some patients have experienced ongoing symptoms for much longer. This has become known as ‘long Covid’. However, new research suggests that the rates of ongoing symptoms and functional impairment after Covid are indistinguishable from other post-viral illnesses, and that long Covid may have appeared to be a distinct and severe illness because of high volumes of Covid-19 cases during the pandemic. Presenter Claudia Hammond is joined in the studio by BBC Health reporter Philippa Roxby to discuss the findings. If long Covid is not unique, could this new spotlight encourage research that would help sufferers of other post-viral conditions? The use of heart pacemakers have become a standard procedure in many countries. Pacemakers are small electrical devices implanted in the chest that send electrical pulses to the heart to keep it beating regularly and not too slowly. The devices can be lifesaving for some people. But devices can malfunction, there can be problems with leads and the batteries in them don’t last forever. Over half of all pacemaker patients live long enough to require a battery replacement operation, which carries a risk of serious complications including life-threatening infection. This can have big cost implications for health systems and devastating consequences for patients. Reporter Hannah Fisher attends one of these operations to find out more. An initiative to make the right to abortion part of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights has been introduced to the European Parliament. This comes on the heels of France making abortion a constitutional right earlier this month, in stark contrast to the removal of abortion as a constitutional right in the USA in 2022. We assess the initiative’s chances of success and discuss the ripple effect of US politics on abortion rights across the rest of the world.Amputees who use prosthetic limbs have to get used to the fact that they do not experience the sensations that they were previously used to. But now researchers in Italy and Switzerland have developed a temperature-sensitive robotic hand that allows amputees to discriminate between objects of different temperatures and sense bodily contact with other humans. Solaiman Shokur of École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne tells Claudia how it works. And Philippa brings the story of Paul Alexander, a polio survivor who spent most of his life inside an iron lung. An iron lung is a metal cylinder enclosing the body up to the neck, with bellows to force the lungs to inflate and deflate. The device has been obsolete since the 1960s, but he continued to use his until he died recently. 72 years after Paul contracted polio, we look at how the disease has nearly been eradicated worldwide. Presenter: Claudia Hammond Producer: Ben Motley and Margaret Sessa-Hawkins(Photo: Man in bed. Credit: Catherine Falls Commercial/Getty Images)

The podcast explores a new global study on asbestos-related cancer, Mike's kidney transplant journey, updated Hepatitis B treatment guidelines in Africa, a breakthrough in mesothelioma treatment, a novel cancer treatment method in Brazil, and the challenges of disease spread amid a dengue outbreak.

Over one billion people are obese globally; underweight numbers decreasing. Sleep deprivation raises type 2 diabetes risk; healthy diet can't compensate lack of sleep. Study shows screen time affects language development in children. Podcast covers global malnutrition shift, kidney transplant impact, and films in health education.