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This is my take on the medical and health issues of the day, especially those involving research and ethics
15 hours ago
The number of patients taking part in clinical trials in England has trebled in five years.
Figures from the National Institute of Health Research (NIHR) show almost 638,000 patients volunteered last year.
02:49 UK time, Friday, 17 May 2013
Time-lapse imaging which takes thousands of pictures of developing embryos can boost the success rate of IVF, according to British research.
The method, reported in Reproductive BioMedicine Online, can be used to select embryos at low risk of defects.
17:41 UK time, Monday, 13 May 2013
The emergence of the novel coronavirus is a reminder of the potential threat we face from emerging diseases. A decade ago hundreds of people were killed by severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS).
Although the novel coronavirus is from the same large family of pathogens as SARS, it is very different. And although media reports usually mentions the new virus and SARS in the same breath it is worth pointing out that coronaviruses also produce infections like the common cold.
22:13 UK time, Wednesday, 1 May 2013
There is a new disease in town - at least there is if you live in eastern China. Long after most people had lost interest in - and the media had stopped writing about - H5N1 bird flu, we now have to get used to another assortment of letters and numbers. So should we all worry about H7N9?
"Yes and no" seems to sum up the view of experts. Yes, because of the potential of flu viruses to cause global disease outbreaks - pandemics. No, because the virus is still confined to China and has no ability at present to transmit between humans.
10:36 UK time, Wednesday, 24 April 2013
It would seem that more and more of us are opting for a bit of help to slow the appearance of ageing.
The idea of growing old gracefully - wrinkles and all - seems anathema to a growing number of Britons.
18:46 UK time, Tuesday, 9 April 2013
It is 15 years since Dr Andrew Wakefield published research suggesting a possible link between the MMR vaccine and autism.
Although both he and his research have been discredited, the MMR scare still casts a long shadow.
19:24 UK time, Friday, 29 March 2013
Fergus added analysis to:
The plan to cut the number of children's heart surgery units in England has led to a bitter and protracted dispute.
There is almost universal support for the concept of fewer, bigger and better heart units.
22:00 UK time, Wednesday, 27 March 2013
Producing vaccines against viral threats is a potentially hazardous business and that's why manufacturers have to operate strict controls to ensure that no pathogens escape.
British scientists have developed a new method to create an entirely synthetic vaccine which doesn't rely on using live infectious virus, meaning it is much safer.
17:06 UK time, Friday, 15 March 2013
Surgeons in London have carried out the first 'warm liver' transplant using an organ which was 'kept alive' at body temperature in a machine.
Usually donor livers are kept on ice, but many become damaged as a result.
13:30 UK time, Wednesday, 13 March 2013
Imagine having £600m to give away - every year. That is what Sir Mark Walport has been doing for the past decade at the Wellcome Trust.
It is the biggest medical charity in Europe and second in the world to the Gates Foundation in terms of grants.
02:44 UK time, Thursday, 7 March 2013
What is it about the Italians? They smoke more than us, they earn less, their economy is in even worse shape than ours, they spend less on healthcare, and yet - they live longer. Not just a bit, but a whopping 18 months more on average.
They also have more years of good health before disease and disability set in.
18:00 UK time, Tuesday, 26 February 2013
The pharmaceutical company Roche has announced that it will make more of the data from its clinical trials available to researchers.
The company says it will appoint a panel of experts to evaluate and approve requests to access anonymised patient data.
23:16 UK time, Friday, 15 February 2013
You may have noticed that I've spent quite a bit of my time reporting about horsemeat in recent days.
I'm the medical correspondent and so that might make you assume that there is a strong health angle to the horsemeat contamination scandal.
13:23 UK time, Wednesday, 13 February 2013
Fergus added analysis to:
The emergence of any new virus that poses a threat to human health is a cause for concern.
If the pathogen can spread from person to person, it becomes a significant issue. But the indications are the dangers to the general population are very low.
12:18 UK time, Monday, 4 February 2013
A major trial of a new booster vaccine has ended in failure, marking a major setback in the fight against tuberculosis (TB).
It was the first big study in infants since the Bacillus Calmette-Guerin (BCG) vaccine was introduced in 1921.
01:14 UK time, Monday, 28 January 2013
Glance at the latest figures for polio incidence and it would appear that the world is within touching distance of eradicating the disease.
Last year there were just 205 cases of naturally occurring poliovirus compared with 650 cases in 2011 and a staggering 350,000 a quarter of a century ago.
03:20 UK time, Friday, 18 January 2013
If you signed up to a medical trial you might assume that the results of the research would eventually be published. But that is far from certain. Pharmaceutical companies are under no legal obligation to publish all the available data about drugs.
A group of 53 clinical trial participants has written an open letter to the European Medicines Agency - the body which licenses drugs. Some of the individuals are healthy volunteers and other have conditions like cancer.
15:20 UK time, Tuesday, 8 January 2013
Urgent appeals for blood donors seem to be a regular event - certainly at this time of year. So what triggers an appeal and is it feasible that we could ever run out of blood?
NHS Blood and Transplant (NHSBT), which runs the service in England and north Wales, put out an urgent appeal for O negative donors last week. It currently has just 3.2 days of O neg blood, while the Welsh Blood Service has four days and the Scottish Blood Transfusion Service has 6.1 days.
01:22 UK time, Saturday, 22 December 2012
Ready for Christmas? You may have your Christmas menu planned, your tree decorated and your presents wrapped, but have you thought about the potential dangers? Don't worry, I have - and so have lots of other people intent on ensuring you keep well this festive season.
So here, in no particular order, is my personal selection of the top 10 Christmas health risks. I naturally expect readers to take great exception with the list and suggest their own and probably to accuse me of being a Christmas kill-joy. Not so, but a few sensible precautions could help prevent this being a festive period to forget. A merry - and healthy - Christmas to you all.
20:47 UK time, Friday, 21 December 2012
The outcome of the Neon Roberts court case was never in doubt.
On one side there was Neon's entire medical team, and the weight of evidence from peer-reviewed cancer studies who agree that he urgently needs radiotherapy; on the other was his mother who failed to produce any evidence at all of alternative treatment.
Fergus began working for the BBC in 1984 and has reported on health, science and medicine for nearly 20 years. Follow Fergus on Twitter.
He has reported for the BBC from around the world on topics such as stem cells, obesity, HIV/AIDS, malaria, TB, polio and swine flu.
Fergus has had his genes sequenced, his heart, brain and other body parts scanned, as well as being vaccinated against bird flu for his reports.
He appeared in a BBC TV drama with Julie Walters. He didn't win any awards for his acting, but has won several for his journalism.
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