One in Six Billion

Professor Maggie Shepherd reflects back on her career and how she made the massive steps from being a clinical nurse to becoming a nationally leading researcher and educator. Send a text

Grace Bervoets talks about living with cystic fibrosis and cystic fibrosis related-diabetes. Amanada Stride, who works as a diabetes consultant helping people with cystic fibrosis related-diabetes, explains the many challenges of this unusual type of diabetes. Send a text

Farah O'Regan talks about how her son who had Down syndrome and a severe congenital heart condition needing surgery diagnosed in pregnancy and then developed Type 1 diabetes on day 2 of life. In early childhood he was diagnosed with 2 more autoimmune conditions, coeliac disease and hypothyroidism. Researcher Matt Johnson explains his research which has established that Down syndrome directly results in very early-onset autoimmune diabetes. Send a text

Cassi Connelly talks about her experience of having familial partial lipodystrophy characterised by a loss of fat and muscular appearance of her arms and legs. She had multiple medical problems including diabetes for decades before the diagnosis of familial partial lipodystrophy was finally confirmed by a genetic test. Her treatment is now better tailored to her needs. Send a text

We talk to John Dennis, a data science researcher working in the University of Exeter. He used data from 1 million people with Type 2 diabetes to discover how the clinical characteristics of a patient alter the glucose lowering with different treatments. John’s 5 drug model, published in the Lancet in late February 2025, uses simple clinical information to identify, for the first time, the best glucose lowering treatment for a patient. The model selected best treatment lowers the glucos...

Ru Kovvuri explains about her battle to get a diagnosis and support for her daughter who had multiple medical problems and learning difficulties as a result of a deletion of the HNF1B gene. Rhian Clissold discusses her research to improve the diagnosis of the HNF1B syndrome and recognise the associated learning difficulties seen with loss (deletion) but not the spelling mistakes (mutations) in the HNF1B gene. Send a text

Natalie Raphael was diagnosed as having glucokinase MODY at the end of her first pregnancy. In her second pregnancy she had a recently introduced blood test that showed her fetus had not inherited her change in the glucokinase gene so was at risk of growing large. As a result of this she was given long-acting insulin to lower her glucose. Alice Hughes is the researcher who did the key study that proved the new blood test was both practical and accurate in glucokinase pregnancy. Send a t...

In this episode we talk to Andrew Lotery about how he was found to have a raised fasting glucose on an insurance medical. He was treated as Type 2 diabetes but he questioned this as he was young. slim and physically fit. A chance reading of a research funder’s newsletter led him to the Exeter team and a diagnosis of glucokinase MODY. Amanda Stride worked as a research registrar in Exeter. She showed that in glucokinase MODY the fasting glucose was raised from birth and remained ...