When doctors talk about infections, they are usually referring to acute situations in which the immune system gets overwhelmed by a virus such as influenza or chickenpox. Infections also result from the interaction of bacteria with the immune system, as in the case of pneumonia or sepsis. These can be crises, but they are relatively […]

Do you worry about things you can’t see, smell or taste? Most of us don’t. Yet particles we can’t detect with our five senses are often present in the air we breathe. They have the power to make us sick. How can we achieve cleaner indoor air so that we have less chance of coming […]

This week our guest is gastroenterologist Robynne Chutkan. She explains how keeping our digestive microbiota in good health can help our immune systems fight off pathogens from the inside out. At The People’s Pharmacy, we strive to bring you up to date, rigorously researched insights and conversations about health, medicine, wellness and health policies and […]

Diabetes is a serious metabolic disorder that affects close to 40 million Americans. Most of them have type 2 diabetes, which means their bodies produce insulin, but their cells are not very responsive to it. As a result, blood sugar builds up and people run the risk of cardiovascular complications like heart attacks or strokes, […]

When the thyroid gland stops working efficiently, the effects resound throughout the entire body. That’s because this little gland controls metabolism in all our tissues. Before there was a treatment, thyroid disease was sometimes deadly. Doctors started prescribing natural desiccated thyroid derived from animals 130 years ago. This worked well. Synthetic levothyroxine (a thyroid hormone) […]

For decades, neurologists and pharmaceutical firms have been focused on amyloid plaque building up in the brains as the cause of Alzheimer disease. Drug companies have developed compounds to remove that plaque, and they have been successful. There are medicines, notably lecanemab and donanemab, that reduce the amount of amyloid plaque visible on a scan. […]

Heart disease is still our number one killer, even though 50 million Americans have been prescribed a cholesterol-lowering statin. Cardiologists pay a lot of attention to cholesterol in all its variety: total cholesterol, LDL, HDL, VLDL. Even blood fats like triglycerides and lipoprotein a [Lp(a)] are getting some attention. What else do you need to […]

The guest for this episode is sleep expert and medical communicator par excellence, Dr. Roger Seheult. With his certification in sleep medicine, he will tell you why you need to get enough sleep, along with how much is enough. If you find you have trouble sleeping, what can you do about it? Dr. Seheult has […]

Losing weight is hard. That’s probably why almost three-fourths of American adults are overweight or obese. On this episode, we speak with a distinguished doctor and former FDA commissioner who has personal experience struggling with the scale. In this discussion of popular weight-loss drugs like Wegovy, we tackle the biology of weight. We also interview […]

Do you love your hair the way it is? Many of us wish our hair were different–curlier, straighter, darker or lighter. But what people worry about most with their hair is when they lose it. Can you keep your hair from falling out? Why does hair loss affect some people, including women as well as […]