Blog: Child Health

Medical editor, Dr Harry Brown continues his everyday tips series and reviews online prescribing resources to help doctors make therapeutic interventions.

Constipation is a widespread issue with GPs seeing on average 6.3 patients with constipation each week. Over two million minutes a week are spent in consultations for constipation, equivalent to over 200,000 GP appointments. Yet it a problem not taken seriously enough by patients.

The World Health Organization has confirmed today that the UK and three other European countries have lost their measles elimination status. Now all the hard work has to start again.

Almost one in five children are overweight or obese when they start primary school, rising to one in three when they start secondary school. Childhood obesity is a health challenge that forms a major part of the Government's new prevention green paper, but how can real progress be made?

The UK has one of the most unequal distributions of wealth of all western countries impacting on health outcomes. A new report today by the Social Metrics Commission revealed that seven million people are living in persistent poverty.