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Episode one
Does more sleep lead to better health? It would hardly be a spoiler to announce that, yes, extra sleep does indeed have benefits – a revelation that seems pretty flat in this new series which aims to cut through contradictory and confusing medical advice to get to a nugget of wisdom.
Michael Mosely – that wonderfully game-for-anything TV doctor who propelled the obscure 5:2 diet into the mainstream – fronts the show, and he’s enlisted the help of three other professionals: A&E specialist Saleyha Ahsan, surgeon Gabriel Weston and doctor Chris van Tullekan. Between them, they perform experiments (pitting soap against anti-bacterial gel, for example), debunk myths (apparently we don’t need two litres of water a day) and chat to experts about subjects such as the pros and cons of an aspirin a day.
At its best, the show uncovers a buried truth – it kicks off by proving fat people can be fit, and being labelled ‘obese’ shouldn’t be based on BMI alone. At its most uninspiring, ‘Trust Me I’m a Doctor’ states the obvious and, worse still, delivers its lacklustre findings through such a visually dull format, it may as well have been commissioned as a mid-morning radio show.