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Speaker 1: You're listening to the Saturday Morning with Jack Team podcast

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Speaker 1: from News Talk z EDB.

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Speaker 2: Quarter to eleven on News Talks EDB. Men's Health Week

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Speaker 2: was a couple of weeks ago in June, but we

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Speaker 2: want to talk about it now because men's health shouldn't

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Speaker 2: just be a week, it should be every single week.

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Speaker 2: And doctor Brian Betty is with us this morning. Kilder Brian,

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Speaker 2: why is men's health so important?

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Speaker 3: Oh? Look, I think there's some real underlying statistics that

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Speaker 3: are really important to reflect on. You know, there's big

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Speaker 3: studies overseas that show that men are twice as likely

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Speaker 3: as women never to have visited their doctor or GP,

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Speaker 3: that three times is likely not to have seen their

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Speaker 3: GP in the last five years. And in New Zealand,

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Speaker 3: men die three and a half years younger than woman.

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Speaker 3: They also developed things like heart disease ten years earlier,

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Speaker 3: they develop diabetes earlier. So they've got this cluster of

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Speaker 3: things that go on that are really really important and

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Speaker 3: it should be a concern that we think about. We

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Speaker 3: think about men's health and we think about do all

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Speaker 3: the time.

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Speaker 2: So for the guys who are listening now, or people

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Speaker 2: who have guys in their life, who maybe have put

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Speaker 2: off that trip to the doctor for a little too long.

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Speaker 2: Why should they be visiting their GP.

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Speaker 3: Well, look, I think one of the big reasons. And

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Speaker 3: then it's this cluster of hidden health problems that can

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Speaker 3: start to develop over time early on, and if we

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Speaker 3: don't go to see our GP, if we don't go

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Speaker 3: to see our doctor, we won't know about them. And

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Speaker 3: early intervention is really really important. So there's three in

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Speaker 3: particular that are a great concern. One is cholesterol, So

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Speaker 3: if you don't get a blood test, if you don't

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Speaker 3: see your doctor, you don't know that you may have

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Speaker 3: a cholesterol problem. And cholesterols those fats that flow around

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Speaker 3: to the bloodstream and clog up heart vessels in particular

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Speaker 3: and can cause heart attacks. So I mentioned that men

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Speaker 3: have heart disease ten years earlier. That's one of the

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Speaker 3: reasons that occurs. So we need to check for that

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Speaker 3: quite regularly. The other one is sugars, which can lead

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Speaker 3: to diabetes. So when sugars start to go up in

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Speaker 3: the bloodstream, they can start to damage the heart, they

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Speaker 3: can start to damage the kidneys, they can start to

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Speaker 3: damage the nervous system. And the thing is we don't

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Speaker 3: know it's happening until we test it, so it's really

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Speaker 3: really important. And the third one is what's called the

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Speaker 3: silent killer, and that's blood pressure. So again unless we

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Speaker 3: test our blood pressure over time, we don't know it's

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Speaker 3: going up. And again that can lead to stroke, heart attacks,

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Speaker 3: and kidney damage. So these things are hidden. They're called

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Speaker 3: the silent hiss and unless we go we don't know

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Speaker 3: it's happening. And early is better than late.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, exactly. And of course there are a couple

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Speaker 2: of other issues that men in particular should be concerned

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Speaker 2: about or aware of.

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Speaker 3: Well, probably the big one is the prostate. And again

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Speaker 3: from about the age of fifty onwards, I think you

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Speaker 3: do need to be going to your GP having a

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Speaker 3: chat about whether you should get a prostate examination, which

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Speaker 3: is basically a simple blood test and look as the

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Speaker 3: finger up the back passages everyone talks about to check

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Speaker 3: that the prostate's healthier normal size, because again early detection

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Speaker 3: of prostate problems leads to cure. If you leave it

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Speaker 3: till it's late, it's often too late, and that's the

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Speaker 3: problem we run into. The Other one that's just started

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Speaker 3: to happen is bowel screening. So you get a cat

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Speaker 3: through the mail every two years. It's a little pooh

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Speaker 3: sample you have to do. You send it away and

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Speaker 3: if there's little changes in that they can we can

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Speaker 3: then progress you to the specialist to examine the bewel

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Speaker 3: and look for any changes it may lead to bowel cancer.

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Speaker 3: So again it detects problems early. There's just a couple

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Speaker 3: of other ones that I think are worth mentioning. I

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Speaker 3: think skin checks, especially if you're in the country or

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Speaker 3: a farmer. I think once a year going to see

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Speaker 3: a GP for a skin check is really very important

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Speaker 3: for those early signs of skin cancer. And the other

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Speaker 3: big one which men are really reticent with is you know,

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Speaker 3: sort of if you're feeling down, if you're feeling anxious,

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Speaker 3: if you're feeling a bit depressed, often a good thing

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Speaker 3: to do is just look, go to your GP, go

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Speaker 3: to your doctor and have a chat about it, because

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Speaker 3: again we can do things about that.

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Speaker 2: Okay, a simple question, but maybe then maybe a bit so,

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Speaker 2: but how often should men go for a check out?

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Speaker 2: When should we be going?

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Speaker 3: Look? Really good question. Look, I think from the age

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Speaker 3: of fifty, I think you should be going once a year, right,

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Speaker 3: because what we know about cholesterol, sugars and blood pressure.

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Speaker 3: They tend to go up as we get older, so

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Speaker 3: I think you need to keep on top of that.

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Speaker 3: So yearly from the age of fifty and from about

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Speaker 3: the age of thirty, I think every two to five years,

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Speaker 3: depending on what's going on, is really really a wise

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Speaker 3: thing to do. So I think you know, with all

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Speaker 3: these things, early detection actually saves lives. It leads to

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Speaker 3: cure rather than leaving things late. So I think getting

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Speaker 3: into the habit of doing that from about the age

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Speaker 3: of thirty onwards, and certainly from the age of fifty

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Speaker 3: every year, I think you should be going and then

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Speaker 3: just having a chat and looking at what needs to

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Speaker 3: be done.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, that is just great advice. Thank you so much, Brian.

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Speaker 2: What we're going to do is we'll make sure we

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Speaker 2: clap up Brian there and we put them on the

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Speaker 2: newstorks hed Be website. If there's someone in your life

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Speaker 2: who you should be hearing Brian's message there but maybe

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Speaker 2: didn't or is a bit too proud, you can just

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Speaker 2: send them that little link and no one needs to

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Speaker 2: be any the wiser. Newstalkshib dot co dot mz is

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Speaker 2: the best place to go for that it is ten

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Speaker 2: to eleven, Non Newstalk's EDB.

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Speaker 1: For more from Saturday Morning with Jack Tame, Listen live

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Speaker 1: to Newstalks EDB from nine am Saturday, or follow the

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Speaker 1: podcast on iHeartRadio