This week on the podcast, Dr Louise is joined by Tova Gillespie, a working single parent to two daughters, one of whom has severe disabilities and complex medical needs. Here she talks about the challenges of being perimenopausal while being a carer and how it’s easy to not recognise or understand your symptoms.   Louise and Tova discuss how it’s easy for your own needs to end up at the bottom of the to-do list when you’re a carer or have a busy family life, and Tova shares three tips for anyone who may not be looking after themselves: Learn to ask for and accept help. People want to hel ..read more

This week on the podcast, journalist Bryony Gordon, bestselling author of several books including her latest, Mad Woman, explains how the perimenopause caused her to reconsider her mental health. Was her experience of OCD affected by her hormones and what would society look like if women’s health was taken more seriously? Bryony shares her belief that there’s a 'witchy magic' to menopause and that the issues it brings are the ones that you need to deal with and there is power in doing so. Finally, Bryony shares three bits of advice to any woman being dismissed with 'it’s just your hormones ..read more

This week, Dr Louise is once again joined by journalist and activist Kate Muir, who made the Davina McCall documentary Sex, Myths and the Menopause. In Kate’s new book, Everything You Need to Know About the Pill (but were too afraid to ask), she turns her attention to the hormones commonly used in the contraceptive pill. Kate shares personal stories of how women have been negatively affected by synthetic hormones and uncovers the bad science and patriarchy that have had such an impact on women’s health. She also offers hope that women have options and can demand change. Finally, Kate shares th ..read more

In this week’s podcast Dr Louise is joined by Dr Mary Claire Haver, an obstetrics and gynaecology doctor and a menopause specialist in the US. Dr Louise and Dr Mary Claire discuss the challenges of ensuring all women have access to evidence-based information and treatment, and their hopes for change. Dr Mary Claire shares her three tips to help menopausal women improve their health: Really focus on your nutrition. Make sure you're getting adequate fibre in your diet every day. Fibre-rich goods are good for you gut microbiome, help you stay full for longer, and are good sources of vitamins, mi ..read more

The Dr Louise Newson Podcast is celebrating two huge milestones this week: not only is the podcast five years old, we’ve hit six million downloads since Dr Louise started her podcast back in March 2019! Making a welcome return to the podcast this week is world-renowned neuroscientist Dr Lisa Mosconi, PhD. Her new book, The Menopause Brain is released on 21 March and in it Dr Lisa shares some of the fascinating changes that occur to the brain during menopause. In this episode, Dr Lisa explains how our understanding of the importance of hormones’ role in the brain is relatively new – man was wal ..read more

Joining Dr Louise on this week’s podcast is Alex Newman, a substance misuse therapist with a special interest in the menopause. Alex’s passion is supporting women who are self-medicating menopausal symptoms with alcohol and drugs – a recent survey by Newson Health of nearly 1,200 women found some were spending nearly £3,000 a year on alcohol and over-the-counter medication in a bid to cope with menopause-related symptoms. The pair discuss the relationship between substance misuse and menopause, and crucially, strategies on how to get help for yourself or a loved one. Follow Alex on Instagram ..read more

Content advisory: this episode contains themes of suicide and self-harm Joining Dr Louise on this week’s podcast is Wendy Barker. Wendy experienced postnatal depression after the birth of her first child in the late 80s and was later diagnosed with premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD), a very severe form of premenstrual syndrome. ‘For probably three weeks of the month, I was like a coiled spring,’ Wendy recalls. ‘And the only way that I would get anything sort of relief from that would be to either rage, scream, shout, and then there'd be the tears. And then I would think that's it until it ..read more

This week Dr Louise is joined by feminist cultural historian Dr Elinor Cleghorn, author of Unwell Women, which unpacks the roots of the misunderstanding, mystification and misdiagnosis of women’s bodies, illness and pain. From the ‘wandering womb’ of ancient Greece to today’s shifting understanding of hormones, menstruation and menopause, Unwell Women is the story of women who have suffered, challenged and rewritten medical misogyny. Elinor tells Dr Louise how the book draws on her own experience of being dismissed by doctors for years before finally being diagnosed with systemic lupus, an aut ..read more

On this week’s podcast, Dr Louise is joined by Dr Ashley Winter, a urologist and sexual medicine specialist, and Dr Sarah Glynne, a GP and menopause specialist who is a member of the research team at Newson Health and chairs a working party that promotes access to evidence-based menopause care for patients with breast cancer. They discuss Fezolinetant – brand name Veoza – a new drug recently approved in the UK and other countries to treat moderate to severe hot flushes in menopausal women aged 45 to 60 years. You can read an article about fezolinetant on the balance website here. Rel ..read more

In this episode, Dr Louise is joined by Dr Clair Crockett, a GP and menopause specialist at Newson Health. Dr Clair has completed diplomas in Obstetrics and Gynaecology, and Sexual and Reproductive Health, and fits coils and implants. Here, she discusses some of the challenges for perimenopausal and menopausal women when it comes to contraception, and the importance of individualisation. She gives an insight into the hormones used in the contraceptive pill and HRT and shares how the Mirena coil can be transformative for some women. Finally, Dr Clair suggests three things to consider about cont ..read more