Joining Dr Louise Newson on the podcast this week is Jen Moore, a campaigner dedicated to raising awareness of endometriosis and adenomyosis.

Jen started experiencing endometriosis symptoms at the age of 11, but it took her 22 years to receive a diagnosis of endometriosis, adenomyosis and fibroids. By this stage organ failure was a risk and she required multiple surgeries, including a hysterectomy.

She has since become committed to helping other women – from speaking out to creating research projects. Here, she shares three things she believes women with endometriosis can do to make a difference to their future health:

1. Find a specialist – someone you can ask as many questions as you want, because if they are genuinely a specialist, they will not be afraid of answering questions.
2. Don’t feel like you have to do it alone. You have your medical team, but you also need a team outside of the hospital. It doesn’t matter who it is, even if it’s somebody online, just reach out. There are so many of us who are just happy to help even if it’s just to talk.
3. Keep going. When you get your diagnosis, you can think awesome, everything’s going to change. But then you realise, that’s just the start of it – you’ve got this wait list to get treatment and it can be a long slog. It’s exhausting, but it’s important that we do.

You can follow Jen on Instagram at @jen.dometriosis and find out more at www.jenmoore.co.uk

For more information on Newson Health, click here.

This week, Dr Louise is joined by Nicola McFarlane, who was diagnosed with motor neurone disease (MND) in 2023.

Nicola shares the story of her MND diagnosis, as well as the barriers she faced in accessing treatment for perimenopause symptoms – including low mood, anxiety and recurrent UTIs – to improve her quality of life.

Nicola talks about how health professionals often put her perimenopause symptoms (which pre-dated her MND diagnosis) down to her MND, and why she is sharing her own experiences to help other women living with MND and facing hormonal changes.

For more information on Newson Health, click here.

On this week’s episode Dr Louise is joined by Dr Marty Makary, Johns Hopkins professor, member of the National Academy of Medicine and bestselling author.

Together they discuss the impact of the Women’s Health Initiative study on women’s hormone health, menopause education for healthcare professionals and the importance of patient-centred care that focuses on root causes, rather than just symptoms.

Dr Marty talks about his new book Blind Spots, and the importance of asking big questions in medicine.

You can follow Dr Marty on Instagram @martymakary, and TikTok @marty.makary

For more information on Newson Health, click here.

Dr Louise Newson’s first-ever live theatre tour, Hormones and Menopause – The Great Debate, runs until 12 November. For more information and tickets, click here.