Mini-organs, sex in aged care and mental health at the GP's office

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Health Report 29 min 2 speakers 8 chapters transcribed 1 hour ago

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What topics does this Health Report episode cover?

Unknown 0:02

This is an ABC podcast.

James Bullen 0:06

Hello and welcome to the Health Report with me, James Bullen. Today, your mental health in the doctor's office and beneath the bed covers with baby boomers.

Alison Rahn 0:15

Now the baby boomers said loud and clear, we are still sexual, we can't see ourselves ever not being sexual. We want the choice to remain together, we want the choice to share a bed. And these are the variety of things we do together on a daily basis sexually and no one is going to interfere with that.

James Bullen 0:34

But first we're headed to the lab to find out more about organoids. That's the term that's been coined for these tiny lab-grown organs. It's a new field of medical science that's only been around for ten years.

Shaffer Waters 0:47

To create the organ, they actually need to be housed into a matrix that supports them. So the combination of this matrix and a very specialized media, which is kind of like food for the cells, this makes the cells to actually differentiate and create a miniaturized version of whatever organ they came from. So if it was a brushing of the nose or if it was a brushing of the lung, they will create a miniaturized nose or a miniaturized lung. If it was a biopsy from the gut, then it will be a mini gut.

James Bullen 1:23

Organoid researchers say these smidges of tissue could help us unlock fresh understandings about the origins of disease and help test new drugs. But this story is also about the real world consequences of benchide research and the promise of personalized medicine.

Ruby Templeton 1:38

My name's Ruby Templeton and I'm twelve years old and I have cystic fibrosis. My pancreas doesn't work as well as everyone else, so I have to take tablets to help it work. And I need to go to the doctors like every three months to get needles and have annual reviews so they can check up on me.

James Bullen 1:58

Ruby's an ordinary 12-year-old. She plays netball, AFL, and dances. She's not a fan of maths class. And she has cystic fibrosis, a genetic disease that harms the lungs and the gut.

Ruby Templeton 2:11

I was like coughing a lot, but now I haven't had that much problems, like I'm not getting as sick as much, and if I'm sick it's just like a normal cold that only lasts like a few weeks, so it's not that as bad as before.

Shelby Templeton 2:23

It has revolutionized her life. It really has. We have no sick days. She's just like any other normal kid, which is really hard because Ruby started high school this year. So she wants to be like all the other kids. Honestly, it's just excellent because this is the closest thing to a cure for her.

James Bullen 2:37

That's Ruby's mum, Shelby. And she says the changes in Ruby's life are down to a new treatment she's been taking for the past three years, a drug called Ivocafta, trade name Kaleidico. But Ruby was only eligible for the drug because of the specific genetic mutation that caused her cystic fibrosis. And to understand what that really means, we need to understand a little more about the condition itself.

Adam Jaffe 3:02

So cystic fibrosis is the commonest inherited disorder that people carry. So one in twenty five people in Australia carry a gene, unknowingly.

James Bullen 3:12

Professor Adam Jaffy is the John Beveridge Professor of Pediatrics at the University of New South Wales and a respiratory pediatrician at Sydney Children's Hospital.

Adam Jaffe 3:21

This gene is important because it encodes for a protein, so that's the bit in the cell that controls a chloride channel, a salt channel.

How are organoids created and what potential do they have for disease research?

Adam Jaffe 3:30

And if the chloride channel doesn't work properly, the airways become full of mucus and very thick, followed by a lot of infection and unfortunately ultimately respiratory failure and ultimately death from uh recurrent infection and lung damage.

James Bullen 3:44

When the gene works, cells produce a thin, watery mucus that acts like a protective lubricant. But when the gene doesn't work, cells make a thick, sticky mucus that clogs the body's organs and invites infection. It affects the whole body, but particularly the lungs and the gut.

Adam Jaffe 4:01

There are about two thousand mutations for cystic fibrosis, of which about four hundred actually cause disease. And we're discovering more and more of these mutations every day and so our understanding about cystic fibrosis and how we can change and discover new treatments is changing rapidly.