Medicine and Science from The BMJ

Screening and serodiscordance

In this week’s podcast Duncan Jarvies talks to Theresa Marteau about screening for diabetes; can patients be given too much information? Also Anne Buvé discusses the likelihood of HIV transmission in serodiscordant couples when the infected partner is receiving antiretroviral treatment.Annabel Ferriman takes us through the news.

Legacy of the games

This week we’ re looking at the legacy of large sports events - with the 2012 Olympic games costing £9bn, and that cost being justified by saying how great an impact the games will have on the health of the nation. We talk to Gerry McCartney about his systematic review of the evidence for those claims.Antibiotic resistance is a major problem, and we increasingly have to turn to second line drugs as bacteria become immune. We have just published a systematic review on bmj.com that looks at the link between prescribed antibiotics in primary care and antimicrobial resistance. Coauthor Alastair Hay tells us about his findings.Annabel Ferriman, takes us through the news.

Healthy heart, happy smile

In this week’s podcast we examine the link between toothbrushing and cardiovascular disease – Richard Watts talks about his research in Scotland.Also this week the Department of Health issued a statement that has made some people wonder about the future of NICE. Fiona Godlee discusses the statement with health economist James Raftery.Finally this week, Evan Harris may have recently lost his seat in parliament, but one thing that’ll keep him busy is his new job as a columnist for the BMJ. Trevor Jackson talks to him about his first column on Wakefield and MMR.

Suicide, sport, and CME

What is the association between IQ and attempted suicide? David Batty talks to us about his research in Sweden.Also this week, Steven Kawczak, associate director of the Cleveland Clinic’s Center for Continuing Education, outlines the clinic’s new CME partnership with the BMJ and BMJ Learning.And finally, Richard Budgett, chief medical officer of the London 2012 Olympics, speaks about how scientists are hoping to beat the cheats. He also discusses a recent BMJ research paper about the limited health and economic benefits that big sporting events have on their host nations. The recent Legacy of the games podcast includes an interview with the lead author of that paper.

I ♥ the smoking ban

This week research published on bmj.com looks at the association between the smoking ban and a drop in acute myocardial infarctions. Anna Gilmore, director of the Tobacco Control Centre at the University of Bath, talks to us about her findings. We also hear from the London Health Observatory about how much money the drop has saved the NHS.

Radios and retinas

Since mobile phones have been around there has been public concern about their safety - fears over radiation exposure causing cancer have been particularly trenchant. This week Paul Elliott and his colleagues published research looking for an increase in the incidence of childhood cancers around mobile phone base stations. Paul joins us in the studio.NCEPOD (the National Confidential Enquiry into Patient Outcome and Death) have published a report on parenteral nutrition. Kayte McCann talks to gastroenterologist Jim Stewart about the findings.Finally, bevacizumab (traded as Avastin) has been used for off-label treatment of age related macular degeneration for some time. The BMJ published research looking at the effectiveness of this monoclonal antibody compared with what was formerly the standard NHS treatment. Adnan Tufail, one of the study’s authors, joins us in the studio.

BMA-on-Sea

This week saw the British Medial Association’s Annual Representatives Meeting. Deborah Cohen and Helen Morant tell us what was going on in Brighton. Also this week we have the second part of Sophie Arie’s special report on Haiti.

Methado, methadon’t, methadone

Later this month sees the 17th International AIDS Conference in Vienna. One of the topics that will be discussed there is harm reduction, and the political will to embrace it.In this podcast, we look at the effects of long term opiate substitution programmes in Muirhouse, Edinburgh. Local GP Roy Robertson discusses the research he conducted there. We also travel to Kiev in Ukraine, where Richard Hurley talks to NGOs and injecting drug users about local harm reduction programmes.

The white paper

The new coalition government’s white paper on health – encompassing the future of the NHS - was published this week. Chris Ham, chief executive of the health policy think-tank the King’s Fund and professor of health policy and management at the University of Birmingham, and Edward Davies, editor of BMJ Careers, discuss their immediate impressions with Ashley McKimm.Also this week a paper on www.bmj.com looks at suicide, and how the method of an attempted suicide relates to a later successful attempt. Professor Bo Runeson from the Karolinska Institutet in Sweden joins us on the phone to discuss his research.

The bridge

This week the print BMJ has a cluster of articles on suicide – one of which talks about the efficacy of physical barriers to prevent suicide from bridges. In the podcast, we’ll hear from Kevin Hines the survivor of such an attempt, and Alys Cole-King, a psychiatrist who wants to break down the stigma of suicide.We’ll also hear from Gordon Smith, one of the authors of a study looking at a link between the time when a mother gives birth – whether it’s in the normal working week, or out of hours - and the risk of neonatal death.Finally Richard Hurley tells us about AIDS 2010, the 25 000 delegate conference in Vienna.