BMJ Best Practice Podcast

Traveller's diarrhoea 02.06.2026 20хв

Traveller's diarrhoea is common. But it is difficult to put a percentage on it as a lot depends on lots of different factors. However, we do know that traveller's diarrhoea can be serious and can cause complications - from lactose intolerance to irritable bowl syndrome. To find out more, please have a listen to this podcast with Daniel Leung, Professor at the Division of Infectious Diseases, Dr Thomas D. Rees and Natalie B. Rees Presidential Endowed Chair in Global Medicine University of Utah School of Medicine. For more on traveller's diarrhoea, visit BMJ Best Practice. Competing interests: DTL receives authorship royalties from UpToDate, Inc, for a chapter on travel medicine; is an author of upcoming chapters on traveller's diarrhoea for the US CDC Yellow Book; is the president-elect of the American Committee on Clinical Tropical Medicine and Travelers' Health - Clinical Group within the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene; and is an author of some of the references cited in this topic.

Shared decision-making in difficult circumstances 19.05.2026 18хв

BMJ Best Practice is our clinical decision support resource. It is designed to help healthcare professionals make better decisions in partnership with their patients. To find out more about shared decision making in a range of difficult circumstances, please do listen to this BMJ Best Practice podcast interview with Amber Washington, Patient Advisory Coordinator, Tampa General Hospital. View BMJ Best Practice's patient information here. Competing interests: None

Bipolar disorder 06.05.2026 25хв

Bipolar disorder is common and important. So it is vital that we get the diagnosis and management of this condition right. To find out more about this condition, please do listen to this BMJ Best Practice podcast interview with Adrian Preda, Professor of Clinical Psychiatry at the University of California, Irvine. For more on bipolar disorder, visit BMJ Best Practice. Competing interests: AP has been compensated as an expert consultant by GLG, Atheneum, Guidepoint, and as the Editor-in-Chief of Psychiatric News.

Pulmonary embolism 30.03.2026 27хв

Pulmonary embolism is common and important. So it is vital that we get the diagnosis and management of this condition right. To find out more about this condition, please do listen to this BMJ Best Practice podcast interview with Scott Woller, Director of the Thrombosis Clinic, Intermountain Medical Center and Professor of Medicine at the University of Utah. For more on pulmonary embolism, visit BMJ Best Practice. Competing interests: SCW declares that he is expecting to receive funding of an investigator initiated grant from Janssen Pharmaceuticals to Intermountain Health - with no direct compensation to himself.

Migraine 02.03.2026 22хв

Migraine is very common, affecting an estimated 1.16 billion people worldwide. It is one of the most disabling neurological disorders. So it is vital that we get diagnosis, management and prevention of this condition right. To find out how to do this, please listen to this BMJ Best Practice podcast with Timothy Collins, Associate Professor of Neurology and Chief of the Headache Division, Department of Neurology, Duke University Medical Center. For more on migraine, visit BMJ Best Practice. Competing interests: TAC provides expert testimony for legal cases regarding headache disorders and treatment (approximately one or two cases per year). TAC is an author of several references cited in the BMJ Best Practice topic on migraine.

Comorbidities 02.02.2026 23хв

Comorbidities are common and important and have a massive impact on the delivery of care. The BMJ Best Practice Comorbidities Manager is designed to help healthcare professionals deliver better care for patients with multiple illnesses. To find out more, please do listen to this podcast with Dr Preethi Pirlamarla, Advanced Heart Failure and Transplant Cardiologist at the University of Washington. Competing interests: PP is a member of the BMJ Best Practice Comorbidities Manager panel.

Shared decision making 22.12.2025 25хв

BMJ Best Practice is our clinical decision support resource. It is designed to help healthcare professionals make better informed clinical decisions. But such decisions should be made in partnership with patients - they should be shared decisions. To find out more about shared decision making, please do listen to this BMJ Best Practice podcast interview with Emma Doble, Patient and Public Strategy Editor at BMJ. Competing interests: None

Mumps 06.11.2025 24хв

Mumps used to be a common childhood disease. Then it became a lot less common because of vaccination. But now unfortunately it is becoming more common again. So it is vital that we get the diagnosis, management and prevention of this condition right. To find out more about this condition, please do listen to this BMJ Best Practice podcast interview with Dr Kristine Macartney, Director of the National Centre for Immunisation Research and Surveillance, Australia. For more on mumps, visit BMJ Best Practice. Competing interests: none

Pertussis 16.10.2025 24хв

Pertussis or whooping cough is an acute infectious disease caused by Bordetella pertussis. It is highly contagious, highly serious, and highly preventable. To find out more about this condition, please do listen to this BMJ Best Practice podcast interview with Professor Sir Andrew Pollard, Director of the Oxford Vaccine Group and Ashall Professor of Infection and Immunity in Oxford. Competing interests: AP has been chair of JCVI for the past 12 years. For more on pertussis, visit BMJ Best Practice.

Social anxiety disorder 25.09.2025 24хв

Social anxiety disorder is common. The 1-year point prevalence rate is about 7% and the estimated lifetime prevalence about 12%. And social anxiety disorder can have a real effect on a patient’s life. To find out more about this condition, please do listen to this BMJ Best Practice podcast interview with Professor Craig Sawchuk of the Department of Psychiatry and Psychology, Mayo Clinic. Craig is also the author of our BMJ Best Practice topic on this subject. For more on social anxiety disorder, visit BMJ Best Practice. Competing interests: None

Measles 08.09.2025 18хв

Measles is a serious disease. Unfortunately, it is making a comeback. So we need to know how to diagnose, manage and prevent it. To find out more about how to do all of this, listen to this BMJ Best Practice podcast interview with Linda Nield, Professor of Medical Education and Pediatrics at West Virginia University School of Medicine. For more on measles, visit BMJ Best Practice. Competing interests: None

Asthma in children 21.08.2025 24хв

Paediatric asthma is the most common chronic respiratory disease globally and is a significant cause of childhood morbidity and mortality. So it is important that we get the diagnosis and management of this condition right. To find out more, listen to this BMJ Best Practice podcast on asthma in children. It features an interview with Helen Brough, Consultant in Paediatric Allergy and Professor in Paediatric Allergy at King’s College London. For more on asthma in children, visit BMJ Best Practice. COI: HB has given speaker talks on food allergy for DBV, Parexel, Stallergenes and Viatris, but these talks were not related to asthma.

Factitious disorders 22.07.2025 21хв

It is difficult to say how common factitious disorders are. A review of psychiatric consultations in a tertiary care setting found about 1% of referrals received a diagnosis of factitious disorder. Using an entirely different approach, researchers examined specimens submitted by patients as kidney stones and found that 3.5% were obviously non-physiological. But whatever the prevalence, the consequences can be serious. They include unnecessary diagnostic procedures or interventions and sometimes self-injury. To find out more about this condition, please do listen to this BMJ Best Practice podcast interview with James Levenson, Professor of Psychiatry at Virginia Commonwealth University. And importantly James is author of our BMJ Best Practice topic on factitious disorders. Competing interests: None For more on factitious disorders, visit BMJ Best Practice.

Down syndrome 24.06.2025 27хв

Down syndrome is the most common genetic cause of intellectual disability, occurring in 1 in about 800 births worldwide. Children and adults with Down syndrome need high quality care from a wide range of different types of healthcare professionals. To find out more about this condition, listen to this BMJ Best Practice podcast interview with Kishore Vellody, Professor of Pediatrics, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. Competing interests: None For more on Down Syndrome, visit BMJ Best Practice.

Generalised seizures in adults 29.05.2025 28хв

In 2016, the estimated number of people globally with active epilepsy was 45.9 million. For the US in 2015, this figure was around 3.4 million. So epilepsy is common and generalised seizures are a common type of epilepsy. And the consequences can be serious - from medication side effects to status to sudden unexpected death. To find out more about this problem and what we can do about it, listen to this BMJ Best Practice podcast interview with Daniel Winkel, Assistant Professor of Neurology at Emory University School of Medicine. For more on generalised seizures, visit BMJ Best Practice. Competing interests: DW receives consulting fees from NextSense, Inc.

Measles, mumps and rubella vaccination 05.05.2025 19хв

Measles, mumps and rubella are all serious illnesses. They are also all preventable. Vaccination is safe and effective. But take up of the vaccine is not what it should be. To find out more about this problem and what we can do about it, please do listen to this BMJ Best Practice podcast interview with Helen Bedford, Professor of Children's Health at the UCL Institute of Child Health. For more on these infections, visit BMJ Best Practice. Competing interests: None

Hypercholesterolemia 08.04.2025 19хв

Hypercholesterolemia is common condition with serious consequences. It is important that we assess, diagnose and manage it appropriately. To find out more about this problem and what we can do about it, please do listen to this BMJ Best Practice podcast interview with Thorsten Leucker, Assistant Professor of Medicine, Division of Cardiology, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. For more on hypercholesterolemia, visit BMJ Best Practice. Competing interests: TL has received grant funding for his university from Amgen and Merck.

BMJ Best Practice and patient safety 24.03.2025 27хв

The purpose of BMJ Best Practice is to provide knowledge that will help healthcare professionals deliver better care. In this podcast, Dr Clare Mock explains how you can put evidence based knowledge into practice to ensure that we achieve high quality and safe healthcare. Clare is Clinical Engagement Physician at BMJ and has a great deal of experience in safety, quality improvement and implementation science. Competing interests: CM works for BMJ.

Hyperkalemia 13.03.2025 22хв

Hyperkalemia is common and can be serious. It can result in life-threatening cardiac arrhythmias. So it is important that we assess this problem properly, find an underlying diagnosis if there is one, and manage appropriately. To find out more about this problem and what we can do about it, please do listen to this BMJ Best Practice podcast interview with Sri Yarlagadda, Associate Professor at The University of Kansas Medical Center. Competing interests: None declared For more on hyperkalemia, visit BMJ Best Practice.

Hypothyroidism 24.02.2025 23хв

Hypothyroidism is common. The prevalence of overt hypothyroidism in the general population ranges between 0.2 and 5%. And it can cause a range of complications - from heart to brain problems to problems during pregnancy. So it is important that we get the diagnosis and management of this condition right. To find out more about this problem and what we can do about it, listen to this interview with Dr Wail Malaty who works as a physician in Houston, Texas. Wail is our BMJ Best Practice author on hypothyroidism. Competing interests: None For more on hypothyroidism, visit BMJ Best Practice.