Ask the Doctor: Oct 30

Tonight on ABC Ask the Doctor is all about Stress and how to manage it.

Stress is the body’s natural response to pressure, when faced with challenging or even dangerous situations. Not all stress is a bad thing. A little can help performance, but if we have too much stress it can have a negative impact on our mood, behaviour and physical health – and many of us don’t realise how stressed we actually are. Chronic or ongoing stress has long been known to increase the risks of high blood pressure, addiction, anxiety and depression.

Sandro admits he’s ‘a bit of a stress head’, but what effect is stress having on his body? He becomes a lab rat in a Deakin University experiment to find out, by submitting to a series of humiliating and stressful situations. It’s as if his worst nightmares have come to life. The tests monitor how much his body reacts to stress in its initial fight or flight response, and then how much of the follow-up hormone cortisol is released. The results are hair-raising!

Caroline discovers a ground-breaking program called ‘Burn to Learn’ that’s helping high school students manage stress. Professor David Lubans from the University of Newcastle in New South Wales is looking for a link between student fitness, cognitive performance and stress.

Meanwhile, Shalin examines the difference between acute stress and chronic stress. One reduces hunger, the other leads to binge eating. Comfort food is officially ‘a thing’, but giving in to it isn’t good idea. Shalin shows the best way to combat this.

After his earlier stress test, Sandro embraces some stress-busting moves to try out at home, many of them easy and free – which won’t add to money stresses at least.

8pm Tuesday on ABC.