Health
Huntington’s Disease
War correspondent Charles Sabine’s 15-year global search to find a cure for the disease that has ravaged his family.
Bariatric Surgery and Mental Health
There is growing concern that bariatric surgery can exacerbate mental health problems
Former England Rugby Captain Lewis Moody’s brain tumour charity
The rugby hero, the teenager with cancer and a bond that left a lifesaving legacy
A Good Death
‘The family is often doing everything to avoid the conversation going to “the worst place” in case it gets emotionally horrible,’ says Dr Mannix. ‘But actually it becomes a lot calmer once you start asking: “If she’s so sick she cannot be saved, what sort of things should we be doing now so we don’t regret anything?”
Organ Donation
When the only hope for Lubna Siddiqui’s critically-ill toddler, Fatima, was a liver transplant
Lisa Wilson’s son, Tom, 22, saved her life through organ donation after he died in a hockey accident aged 22.
Nell Gifford
Founder of the wonderful Gifford’s Circus, Nell was diagnosed with oestrogen receptor positive invasive ductal carcinoma in her left breast in 2015 and the following year, developed it in her right breast. She died on 8th December 2019, aged just 46.
Organ Donation
How Jean Short, 78, saved the life of Chetan Joshi, 44, when she became an altruistic kidney donor..
Simon Brennan
The super-fit father of three who is dealing with motor neurone disease with extraordinary grace and stoicism.
The women left with devastating injuries after childbirth
Millions are left with life-changing injuries after giving birth — yet are too ashamed to talk about it. Now, as doctors and midwives finally act, a searing exposé of childbirth’s shameful secret
Heart Disease: the menace that kills more women than breast cancer, yet is critically under-diagnosed
Alexandra Pringle, editor-in-chief at Bloomsbury Publishing had a near fatal heart attack after suffering chest pain for years. Yet doctor after doctor dismissed her concerns.
Reece Kempley
A silly prank on holiday left Reece Kempley tetraplegic: his mum Rachel is raising the money to pay for Lokomat – a robotic weight bearing therapy which could help restore some movement.
Britain’s most inspiring health worker
Professor Hindmarsh, consultant in paediatric endocrinology and diabetes at University College London
A Good Death
“The family is often doing everything to avoid the conversation going to ‘the worst place’ in case it gets emotionally horrible. But actually it becomes a lot calmer once you start asking: If she is so sick, she can’t be saved what sort of things should we all be doing now so we don’t regret anything? I don’t want them to wish in two week’s time, when they’re suffering agonising grief, that they’d had that conversation.” Palliative care consultant, Dr Kathryn Mannix.
How Felix White, who died aged six from neuroblastoma has helped scientists develop successive versions of ALK inhibitors which turn off the cancer-causing ALK gene
Felix’s parents, Matt and Colleen allowed scientists to draw his blood after he died. His cancer cells were subsequently used in the lab to develop new drugs which are now being put forward as frontline treatment for children with Felix’s disease.
‘I won’t break sweat at sealing a $10 million deal but small things keep me awake..’
The self-made businessman and entrepreneur Lawrence Wosskow on the crippling anxiety that dogged his personal and professional life
“I’m still me, I’m still here..”
The world champion marathon runner Ron Hill, reflects on his dementia diagnosis
A drug, Spinraza, which helps delay the progress of the neuromuscular disorder spinal muscular dystrophy (SMA)
is approved for use in the US and Europe, but flaws in the way medicines are approved in the UK, means children here are missing out.
Consultant endocrinologist, Professor Peter Hindmarsh
Expert in paediatric diabetes and Britain’s most inspiring health worker
The Zero Suicide Campaign
An approach that originated in the United States, its central premise is that suicide is not an inevitability for some people, but wholly avoidable and preventable.
Health Heroes Campaign
Launching the Mail’s new awards campaign to honour unsung medical heroes, Westminster terror victim Stephen Lockwood nominates the surgeon who saved him
Immunotherapy
Why does the ‘miracle’ new cancer therapy help people like Charlie – but not others? This groundbreaking treatment shrinks tumours by ‘switching on’ the immune system to fight foreign cells, but data so far suggests it won’t work for the majority of cancers
It’s completely heartbreaking to hear your child say: ‘I don’t want to live anymore’
Anorexia nervosa in primary school children is on the rise, I spoke to mothers who face a daily battle to keep their children alive
The Great Childbirth Taboo
The Royal College of Midwives has reversed it’s policy on natural labour but it’s too late to help the thousands of women damaged for life by instrumental deliveries
Read more here
Type 1 Diabetes: Every day you’re left thinking: ‘Did I damage him today?’
Type 1 diabetes is a lifelong and potentially lethal affliction that has reached epidemic proportions. It is incredibly difficult to manage — young sufferers and their families tell their moving stories.
A high-pressure autism treatment is changing these little boys’ lives
Tough love. Critics say it is demanding and cruel, and the Department of Health won’t recognise it. But a high pressure autism treatment is changing these little boys’ lives.
Organ Donor Shortage: How Tom Wilson, who was killed aged 22, helped 50 people to live
When Tom was killed in a tragic accident playing hockey, his parents gave permission for all his organs and tissues to be donated.
Tom’s Story
If you are still dithering about joining the organ donor register, read Dr Mary Black on Tom’s story here. It’s the most moving and informative piece I’ve read read on organ donation.
Fistula: Childbirth aged 12 in Sierra Leone
In many parts of Africa, the most prolific killer of young girls is pregnancy. Those who don’t die in childbirth, suffer appalling damage. I met pregnant twelve-year-old girls facing child birth in a Sierra Leone Slum.
Organ Donor Shortage: still unsure whether to carry a donor card?
Read this young couple’s heartbreaking story
Stapedectomy
The writer Bella Bathurst was deaf for 16 years before a groundbreaking operation gave her back her hearing.
Organ Donor Shortage: The story that inspired Jean Short, 74, to donate her kidney to a complete stranger
10,000 people in England are waiting for an organ, most of them kidneys. When Jean read my story about a doctor and father with end stage kidney failure, she decided she would donate her own.
Organ Donor Shortage: how this doctor and father was left with a 1 in 10,000 chance of survival
Dr Simon Howell suffers from kidney failure and desperately needs a kidney transplant. He is grimly realistic about his chances of survival.
It’s agony not being able to ‘fix’ my daughter’s depression
A mother’s heart rending account of her daughter’s mental illness
Sudden Adult Death Syndrome
Every week in the UK, 12 apparently fit and healthy young people die suddenly. Hours before his wedding, Jane Davies’ finance Max Lowry, 33, collapsed: although an ambulance arrived within minutes, there was nothing anyone could do to save him.
Organ Donor Shortage: Should we all be on the organ donor register?
Two organ recipients discuss whether we should have an opt in system in England or an opt out as in Wales where organs are routinely harvested.
Sex and Illness
Doctors don’t bring it up and patients are too shy to talk about it. But chronic illness shouldn’t mean the end of your sex life
Who will care for our autistic adults?
A GP and father of an autistic young adult describes his battle for appropriate care for his son.
Male Suicide
Men in Britain aged 20-49 are more likely to die from suicide than any other cause, yet we are still failing to tackle the crisis.
Organ Donor Shortage: A new heart
A new heart saved Taylor Turner aged 6, now his life hangs in the balance again.
Spinal Muscular Atrophy
Every year, more than 30,000 children in Britain are born, like Alfie, with an inherited genetic disorder.
The brilliant surgeon who realised too late he had sepsis
The symptoms of sepsis can be mistaken for more benign conditions like flu but undiagnosed it can kill within hours.
Sudden Cardiac Death in the young
The undiagnosed heart condition that kills 600 young people under the age of 35 every year. This grief stricken mother believes everybody under the age of 35 should be tested.
Thalidomide: Call the Midwife
Fifty years’ ago, The Sunday Times played a crucial role in uncovering the Thalidomide scandal. As the story is played out again on Call the Midwife, I met the mothers and their who took it and their children who suffered horrific deformities.
Thalidomide: Spain – The Forgotten Victims
When the thalidomide scandal erupted in 1961, the drug was soon banned. Yet pregnant women in Spain continued taking it until the 1980s — and the authorities refuse to accept responsibility.
ICU Psychosis Syndrome
Thousands of intensive care patients suffer terrifying hallucinations and PTSD – we are only just beginning to understand why
It’s completely heart-breaking to hear your child say ‘I don’t want to live anymore’
Toby is nine years old. Last year he began starving himself. His parents, teachers and Doctors have no idea why. Caroline reports on the rise of anorexia in primary school children.