Heart health: the science behind keeping heart disease at bay

Experts reveal how our lifestyles can affect our efforts to keep our hearts healthy

Should we press-gang older people into having fun?

Games such as cribbage, pontoon and shove ha’penny could take us back to the school yard and rattle our marbles

Syphilis diagnoses are booming – it’s clear sexual health needs an overhaul

Responsibility for services is shared by NHS and councils and there is little evidence of a united effort on prevention

Hospital admissions for teenage girls who self-harm nearly double

School work and social media blamed for rise to 13,500 patients from 7,300 in 1997

‘Despairingly lacking’: a midwife on support for breastfeeding mothers

The early stages are crucial, but busy midwives cannot always provide the help that is needed

Dangerous liaisons: why syphilis and gonorrhoea have returned to haunt Britain

Clinic appointments fill up in minutes and babies are once again being born with syphilis – what is behind Britain’s sexual health crisis?

Kick pushchair-chasing companies like Emma’s Diary out of our hospitals

Using the NHS to gain commercial access to pregnant women and new mothers is totally unacceptable

Britain needs to get fit. But warnings and advice alone aren’t enough

It’s taken an integrated strategy to reduce smoking. We need a similar policy to change the way we look at fitness, says public health academic Mike Kelly

From apps to artificial wombs: the smart tech transforming NHS care

Smart pills can keep track of a patient’s correct dose – and could even monitor vital signs

My father received poor treatment for Parkinson’s. Here’s what I did

His care left me horrified – but it spurred me on in my medical career to make sure others didn’t face the same ordeal