A few years ago at the age of 67, Sarah (not her real name) was planning suicide because she was starting to have the same problems her mother suffered from as she developed Alzheimer’s. She couldn’t remember phone numbers or what she had just read and even finding her way around the familiar roads near her […]
Benzos: Beware the baddest drugs in a doctor’s armoury.
August 28, 2013 by 2 Comments
Benzodiazepines are the serial offenders of the drugs’ cabinet with a cluster of pharmaceuticals ASBOs to their name. They’ve been around since the 1960s and are generally given if you are complaining of the likes of insomnia or anxiety – family names include temazepam (for sleep) and the tranquillizer valium. They have a charge sheet that […]
Ten top tips to boost your disease free survival
March 7, 2013 by 5 Comments
In quieter moments, pondering the end of your life, how many years to you think you might be effectively house-bound with a number of chronic diseases before you pop off? The jargon for describing this unappealing state is YLD (Years of Living with Disability) and according to a big report in the Lancet earlier this […]
Coconut outtakes: what the Mail didn’t say
January 8, 2013 by 13 Comments
So you’ve read the Daily Mail story today about how it’s possible that coconut oil can help with some of the symptoms of Alzheimer’s. No one knows for sure because the idea has never been properly tested but there is a good reason why it might work – by supplying the brain with a natural […]
Alzheimer’s: another reason to be sceptical about statins
November 5, 2012 by 7 Comments
The front page of the Daily Express on Friday led with a new warning about statins – combining them with certain blood pressure pills could raise your risk of muscle pains, lung disorders and kidney damage. Hmm yes well. Even as a cholesterol/statin sceptic I thought that was remarkably over-hyped – statin side effects are massively […]
Can fasting for two days each week stop dementia?
August 10, 2012 by 1 Comment
This is an article I wrote about fasting in the Daily Mail back in February. It features top American fasting researcher Dr Mark Mattson who was just about to publish a review of the evidence that, in animals at least, cutting right back on calories a couple of days a week can protect brain cells. […]
Prescribing off label – common and unscientific
April 18, 2012 by Leave a Comment
Two recent reports have just peered into a murky corner of evidence based medicine and found illegal doings and a distinct lack of evidence Over 11% of the prescriptions handed out in Canada were done off-label, according to a study published yesterday What this means that there weren’t clinical trials backing up their use for that condition. […]
Article: Can fasting for two days each week stop dementia?
February 27, 2012 by Leave a Comment
This article was published in The Daily Mail 27 February 2012 [Daily Mail permalink] Fasting was a common medical treatment in the past, but now there may be good reason for it to make a comeback. This research on calorie restriction is directly relevant to our book on healthy ageing. Fasting is now know to trigger […]
Series: Drugged-Up Britain – No. 1
August 14, 2011 by Leave a Comment
No. 1 of 4 articles in Reader’s Digest UK. (August 2011) How did we get to the point where £22m is spent on prescribing drugs—every day? In the first of a four-part special, Jerome Burne launches our campaign to tackle Drugged-Up Britain. When 54-year-old John arrived at a nutritional clinic in south London, he was in a bad […]
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