30 YEARS OF GOOD HEALTH

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WHATEVER you do, don’t ‘Google’ it — that was the advice I was given after being diagnosed with a serious illness just over two years ago, and which I promptly ignored, as you do.

I regretted it pretty much instantly: the internet is crammed with some scary personal stories, as well as often well-intentioned, but too often confusing, misguided and frankly wrong, information.

Of course there are also some superb charity websites offering incredible support and advice. But they aren’t necessarily up with the latest thinking, not least when it comes to diet and lifestyle. that’s because they have to wait for the definitive research.

that’s no criticism — evidence-based medicine is the bedrock of the best care, and it’s what we’ve prided ourselves on reporting in the Good health section. Yet sometimes patients can’t wait for the National Institute for health and Care excellence to make a ruling allowing a new treatment to become available on the NhS.

and sometimes patients have exhausted their options — or don’t know that there are in fact other options. and that’s where Good health comes in.

For a huge range of common problems, from type 2 diabetes and heart disease to chronic pain, depression and other mental health

conditions, as well as the obscure and sometimes only recently identified, our award-winning journalists have gone straight to leading experts for their insight into the cutting edge.

You just can’t get this kind of access on Google.

There is not always a simple answer, and there is often debate and controversy about the ‘right’ approach or even diagnosis.

But what matters is that you, the reader, have the information to help you make an informed decision — even if it’s simply to ask your healthcare provider if ‘this new treatment I’ve read about’ could help.

one of Good Health’s strengths has been its focus on new thinking about diet and lifestyle, not just as prevention but as treatment — an idea increasingly being embraced by mainstream medicine. For instance, as Mail columnist Dr Michael Mosley points out on this page, type 2 diabetes was long regarded as a progressive disease, inevitably meaning a lifetime of increasing medication — even then, the risk of stroke and heart disease remains higher.

But as we reported back in 2015, researchers were already looking at how losing weight and, specifically, swapping to a low-carb diet could change this.

At the time this ran counter to standard advice for people with type 2 to eat ‘plenty’ of starchy carbs such as pasta, but studies have since found it can help reverse type 2 diabetes, and GPs all over the country are offering low-carb diets to patients in their practices.

It’s not the only approach — a groundbreaking study led by Professor Roy Taylor at Newcastle University showed that a rapid low-calorie weight-loss scheme can reverse type 2; this scheme is now being trialled in the NHS.

REGARDLESS of the subject, at the heart of Good Health has been the people who’ve generously told their stories, in often very intimate detail, to help others. Their stories have helped illustrate the often tricky biology and science involved in medicine (the medical jargon our journalists and editors have to untangle can be mind-numbingly obtuse).

They’ve also helped break down the taboos — around women’s post childbirth incontinence, for instance, and the tragedy of suicide. And importantly, they’ve helped drive our campaigns (see page 8) to change things for the better.

We all owe much to drug companies for life-saving medicines, as well as to our incredible, wonderful NHS — and I speak as a beneficiary of both — but mistakes have been made, patients have been harmed and worse.

As a result of these campaigns, guidelines and policy have been changed.

But it’s only thanks to people coming forward with their stories that we’ve been able to shine a light on these issues, the Daily Mail working as a force for good.

But one of the most satisfying things about editing Good Health — as I’ve done for 15 years — is hearing from doctors about you, the readers, coming in ‘waving bits of Good Health’ at them. We regard this as the ultimate badge of honour, and hope you will continue to wave your bits of paper — or screen grabs — for many years to come!