Professor Robin Condliffe

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497 appearances 2 recordings 1 series first heard Jul 2026 last heard 7 Jul

Professor Robin Condliffe’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

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recordings per month · last 12 months

Recordings per month over the last 12 months — 2 in all, peaking in Jul 2026 with 2.

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What's Up Docs? · Doctors' Notes: Lungs Special at Crossed Wires Festival · 7 Jul 2026 podcast

So in ex-industrial cities in the north, we have much higher prevalences of COPD, lung cancer, than certain leafy areas in the south.

Very much so.

I mean, in terms of developing the lung condition.

And you look at lung function.

You've got to go all the way back.

to when you were inside your mum's tummy, because our lungs start developing in the mum's, in the womb, and then they keep developing during childhood.

So if you were born to a mother who was from a lower socioeconomic class, had poor nutrition, maybe had more likelihood of smoking, and then you were in a cramped house with increased risk of infection, increased damp, secondhand smoking, then by the time you get to 18, your lungs may be

Half or two-thirds of the size of someone born on the same day in a wealthier part So you know you never reach the same level and then our lungs all once you get past the age of 35 Are you past 35?

I think it's not barely barely I'm the older twins.

I've just got there once you get past the age of around 35 We all start losing our lung function now if you've got a lung condition you lose it much more rapidly But if you if you're starting from much higher

You've got a lot more years before you get any symptoms.

So there's a big link between all the things we've been talking about, even the size of your lungs to start with, let alone what other conditions you may get.

Yeah, I mean, we don't measure those, you know, when we measure, I don't know if anyone's done any breathing tests at the hospital, the doctor, but you take a full breath in and then you blow as hard as you can.

And now what you can blow in your first second is called the forced expiratory volume in one second.

And that goes down in obstructive lung disease.

We talked about chronic obstructive.

So if you can't breathe out much in one second, then that's your FEV1.

And what you can manage to breathe out in total is your FVC, your forced vital capacity.

So we measure those and they are a surrogate for exactly what is going on in those alveoli.

Well, I mean, the lungs are a thing you should never really think about because you should have no symptoms.

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