Collagen is a protein that is very important for your body. It helps keep your skin, hair, nails, muscles, and joints strong and flexible. As you get older, your body makes less collagen, which can lead to wrinkles, thinner hair, and joint pain. Many people use collagen supplements and beauty products, hoping to look younger and feel better. This article explains what collagen is, how it works, the different types, and whether supplements really help. It also shares natural ways to boost your body’s collagen and clears up common myths.

Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT) is a treatment that helps women manage menopause symptoms, like hot flashes, mood swings, and bone health issues. HRT can improve life during menopause, but it may slightly raise the risk of breast cancer. Knowing how HRT affects breast cancer risk helps women make smart choices for their health. What is HRT? HRT replaces oestrogen, a hormone that drops during menopause. This drop can cause symptoms like night sweats and mood changes. HRT helps balance hormones and relieves these symptoms. Types of HRT: Oestrogen-only HRT: Usually for women who have had their womb removed. Using it with an intact womb can raise the risk of womb cancer. Combined HRT: Has both oestrogen and progestogen. For women with a womb, it lowers womb cancer risk but may slightly raise breast cancer risk more than oestrogen-only HRT. Localised HRT: Creams, rings, or pessaries used in the vagina for dryness. It does not affect the whole body. HRT and Breast Cancer Risk Some studies show that combined HRT can slightly increase breast cancer risk, especially if used for a long time. Risk factors include: Type of HRT: Combined HRT has a higher risk; localised HRT does not. Duration: Using HRT for longer periods, especially combined HRT, can increase the risk. Regular check-ins with your doctor are recommended. Personal/family history: If you or your family have had breast cancer, the risk may be higher. Most research indicates that the risk returns to normal within five years of stopping HRT. Many women still find that HRT improves their quality of life. Factors That Affect Breast Cancer Risk Age: Starting HRT closer to menopause is associated with lower risks. Starting later can increase risk. Family history: Women with a family history of breast cancer should talk to their doctor. Lifestyle: Smoking, alcohol, and being overweight raise breast cancer risk. Healthy habits help lower risk. Duration of use: Short-term use (under five years) has less impact; more prolonged use may increase risk.

Food allergies are on the rise and can cause a great deal of alarm, particularly to parents. How do you know if you or your child has an allergy? Let's take you through the most common food allergies and how you can spot the signs. An allergy to a particular component in food prompts the immune system to go into overdrive, giving symptoms in the gut, skin and airways. Food allergies are common in young children, but most grow out of these as their immune system develops. Reactions vary from mild to severe. They may be as common as affecting one in 10 adults, and up to half of these were reported to have had a severe reaction, according to one study.

Type 2 diabetes is a chronic condition causing high blood sugar levels (glucose). Unlike type 1 diabetes, where the body doesn't produce insulin, type 2 diabetes occurs when the body becomes resistant to insulin or doesn't produce enough insulin to maintain normal blood sugar levels. According to Diabetes UK, over 4.9 million people in the UK have been diagnosed with diabetes, with approximately 90% of them having Type 2 diabetes. This article aims to provide a comprehensive overview of type 2 diabetes, including its risk factors, causes, symptoms, treatments, stages, differences from type 1 diabetes, prognosis, and when to seek medical attention. Diabetes represents a significant burden on the healthcare system in the UK, with the NHS spending approximately £10 billion per year on diabetes-related care, accounting for around 10% of its annual budget. The majority of this expenditure is preventable.

Gynecomastia, while it might sound intimidating, is a condition that many teenage boys experience during puberty. It's common and typically nothing to fret over. Let's delve deeper into gynecomastia, its potential causes, and what steps you can take if you suspect you're dealing with it.

A healthy balanced diet means eating from a variety of food groups to gain the nutrients we need for functioning at our best. We may choose to exclude a particular food group for any number of reasons – faith or religious beliefs, health beliefs, ethical or green reasons, or we may have an allergy or intolerance. Nutrients come under six categories: carbohydrates, protein, fibre, vitamins, minerals and fat. The main food groups incorporated in this include simple and complex sugars, fruit and vegetables, meat, fish, dairy, nuts, and pulses. Excluding any food group can put us at risk of a deficiency, but armed with information, we can source the right foods and supplements to keep us healthy.

DASH stands for Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension. Hypertension means high blood pressure so the DASH diet is using diet changes to help control blood pressure. The diet emphasises having lots of vegetables and fruit along with low-fat dairy, whole grains, fish and poultry and some nuts and seeds and limits refined sugars, red and processed meat along with high fat and saturated fat.

Diabetes mellitus is essentially a problem with keeping your blood sugar in check, and this can have far-reaching consequences from head to toe. Your feet are at particular risk for a number of reasons, and they are checked every year in your annual diabetes check-up at your surgery. This ensures that any problems are found early and addressed.

It’s likely that you’ve heard the term ‘diabetes’ but what is it? What are the symptoms? Are there different types? Will I need insulin? In this quick read article, we'll give you an overview of diabetes and help answer the most common questions we get asked as doctors.

If you’ve been diagnosed with diabetes Type 1 or Type 2, it can take a toll on your eyesight. Over time, and if your diabetes gets out of control, it can affect the back of the eye, called the retina. As part of the long-term care for your diabetes, you will have yearly invites to retinal screening, where they check for early signs of damage. This is available for anyone with diabetes over the age of 12.

A food allergy occurs when the body's immune system mistakenly thinks proteins in food are a threat, and it launches an attack that we experience as unwanted symptoms. These vary depending on the food and the type of allergic response. Common foods to cause allergy include milk, eggs, peanuts, tree nuts, gluten or wheat, shellfish, white fish, soy, sesame and some fruit. Common allergic responses come under gut problems, skin reactions and hay fever-like symptoms. Serious reactions include symptoms related to breathing or swelling around the face or mouth, and these require immediate medical attention. If you have suspicions of a food allergy for you or your child, you may wish to have them tested. This can be done via your doctor, but the NHS often has strict criteria to warrant referral to the allergy service or for testing. If you or your child don’t meet these criteria, but still wish to be tested, this can be arranged privately. Let’s take you through some of the tests and whether they are worthwhile or not. Unfortunately, any results require interpretation along with symptoms – they’re not black and white, you can’t say if an allergy is definitely present or absent. Keeping a food diary can be useful alongside any tests, and noting any patterns related to symptoms.

Food intolerance is when your body struggles to digest food or a component of food, and this causes uncomfortable or unpleasant physical symptoms. It is different from an allergy and is not life-threatening like an allergy can be. Some of the most common culprits are dairy (specifically lactose), wheat or gluten, and caffeine. The most common symptoms of food intolerance are stomach pain, bloating, excessive wind, and diarrhoea. In some instances, food intolerances can lead to mild skin symptoms such as rashes or itching, but these differ in severity from allergic reactions. If you were to suffer symptoms of an allergic reaction, not an intolerance, there is the potential for something called anaphylaxis to develop, which is life-threatening and can develop quickly. The symptoms may include coughing, wheezing, or have noisy or fast breathing. You may see the face, lips and tongue swelling, but the risk is if the throat swells, blocking the airways. Food intolerance symptoms are not very specific to food intolerance and commonly can be caused by other conditions such as stress, anxiety, irritable bowel syndrome, inflammatory bowel disease, and food allergies.