DR JEFF FOSTER is The Sun on Sunday’s new resident doctor and is here to help YOU.
Dr Jeff, 43, splits his time between working as a GP in Leamington Spa, Warks, and running his clinic, H3 Health, which is the first of its kind in the UK to look at hormonal issues for both men and women. See h3health.co.uk.
Q) EVERY week since he was in his thirties, my 70-year-old husband has consumed 40 pints of beer.
Apart from general aches and pains, he seems well and denies having a problem.
His swollen stomach indicates ascites (fluid accumulating in the abdomen) and the whites of his eyes are badly yellowed.
Blood tests never show anything wrong with his liver function and he says I’m worrying about nothing.
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Can he carry on like this without his drinking catching up with him?
Marian Gerrard, London
A) Drinking 40 pints of beer per week exceeds the national recommended amount of weekly alcohol consumption by a whopping 86 units.
A standard pint of beer is about 2.5 units and the national guidance is 14 units per week.
Long-term health risks of high alcohol intake include liver disease, heart disease, stroke, cancer, weakened immune system, memory problems and dementia.
Drinking 100 units per week for 40 years will have a major negative impact on health.
Liver disease may not always be obviously visible but if someone has yellow eyes and ascites, this is a marker of decompensated liver disease, meaning a liver can only tolerate so much before it starts to fail.
Liver function blood test results of someone with jaundice and ascites will be very abnormal, so question his results.
Q) MY wife and I have been trying for our second baby for seven months and she is still not pregnant.
We’re in our early 30s and she fell pregnant fast with our son three years ago.
Should we look into fertility issues for both of us?
John Starnes, London
A) There is an assumption that after a couple have conceived once, there should be no problem having a second child.
However, we commonly see couples who come to clinic concerned that, despite having a child already, they haven’t been able to fall pregnant again.
Three years is a long time in terms of what can happen to our bodies.
Once you have been trying to conceive for more than a year, you might need to look into things.
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There are a few things you can both do to help optimise the chances – being a healthy weight, not smoking, keeping alcohol to a minimum, exercising regularly, having a good, varied diet and being sexually active three times per week.
If these areas are already optimised, then having a semen test for a man and blood tests and an ultrasound scan for a woman can help see if there are any underlying issues.
