Who Is Responsible For Over-Medicalisation? (Your Radical Questions with Dr Suzanne O’Sullivan)
Radical with Amol Rajan
BBC
4.5 • 919 Ratings
🗓️ 30 March 2026
⏱️ 22 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Dr Suzanne O’Sullivan, neurologist and author of The Age of Diagnosis, answers your questions about her book, what it means for women who are under-diagnosed and how she deals with criticism of her work.
GET IN TOUCH * WhatsApp: 0330 123 9480 * Email: radical@bbc.co.uk Episodes of Radical with Amol Rajan are released every Monday and Thursday.
Amol Rajan is a presenter of the Today programme on BBC Radio 4. He is also the host of University Challenge on BBC One. Before that, Amol was media editor at the BBC and editor at The Independent.
Radical with Amol Rajan is a Today Podcast. It was made by Lewis Vickers with Cordelia Hemming. Digital production was by Gabriel Purcell-Davis. Technical production was by Jonny Hall. The editor is Sam Bonham.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, podcasts. |
| 0:05.7 | Hello and welcome to your radical questions. This is where I put your questions to one of our |
| 0:10.2 | magnificent radical guests, and we have had a lot of questions this week. It's your chance |
| 0:14.5 | to engage very directly with the very, very clever, very interesting and influential people |
| 0:19.4 | that we have on this show and ask |
| 0:22.0 | them about their ideas for the future. And Dr. Suzanne O'Sullivan has spent three decades in |
| 0:27.0 | medicine, including 25 years as a neurologist. She's written lots of books, which lots of you |
| 0:31.8 | I happen to know have absolutely adored, including the latest book, which is called The Age |
| 0:37.1 | of Diagnosis. It's really sparked |
| 0:39.4 | a national and indeed global debate about whether, to some extent, mental health conditions, |
| 0:43.4 | but also perhaps physical conditions, are being labelled too readily. She argues that overdiagnosis |
| 0:48.9 | is becoming widespread. And in the main episode, we talked about why she believes this is happening, |
| 0:53.2 | what it means for how we understand mental health and physical health today, and why we should all |
| 0:57.9 | think harder about the trade-offs when it comes to diagnosis. Now, she's here to answer some |
| 1:03.9 | of your questions. Are you feeling ready, Suzanne? I'm ready. Ready, always ready. Here we go. Right. |
| 1:08.0 | Our first question is from Kate, who sent us this note on WhatsApp. Thanks, Kate. |
| 1:12.7 | Is it appropriate for anxiety to be termed as a mental health illness rather than an emotion? |
| 1:21.2 | Are we undermining those with other sometimes life-changing or life-limiting mental health issues by doing so? |
| 1:29.2 | And are we limiting the life outcomes of anxiety sufferers by referring to their issues as mental health? |
| 1:37.3 | I note that a huge number of NHS Fitnotes were issued for anxiety last year |
| 1:42.5 | and I'd be interested to know how many of our |
| 1:46.2 | needs are in this category. Thank you. Kate, thank you so much. We'll start with it. We'll start |
... |
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