Question 1

What causes a stitch when running?

Accepted Answer

The medical name is **exercise-related transient abdominal pain (ETAP)**, and despite how common it is — surveys find most runners experience it — the cause is still not settled. Several explanations have been proposed and the evidence points most strongly at one.

**The leading theory is irritation of the parietal peritoneum**, the membrane lining the abdominal cavity. Friction between its layers, aggravated by movement and by a full or distended stomach, would explain most of the observed pattern: why the pain is sharp and well localised, why it is worse in activities with repetitive torso movement such as running and horse riding, and why it often refers to the shoulder tip, which shares nerve supply with the diaphragm region.

**The older diaphragm-ischaemia theory** — that the diaphragm is starved of blood during hard effort — has fallen out of favour, since it does not fit the evidence well.

**What is well established are the risk factors:**

**Eating or drinking shortly before exercise**, particularly large volumes and especially high-sugar or concentrated drinks. This is the strongest and most consistent finding.

**Being younger** — ETAP becomes less common with age.

**Poor training status**, though experienced athletes still get it.

**Spinal posture**, with some association found for particular curvature patterns.

**What to do in the moment:** slow down, breathe deeply, and press or bend forward on the affected side. Tightening the abdominal muscles while exhaling forcefully helps some people.

**Prevention:** avoid large meals in the two to three hours before running, limit concentrated drinks during exercise, and build intensity gradually.

**Seek medical advice** if abdominal pain during exercise is severe, persists after stopping, occurs with chest pain, breathlessness or nausea, or is a new symptom in someone over 40 — chest and upper abdominal pain on exertion can have cardiac causes.

Question 2

Why does stress cause physical symptoms?

Accepted Answer

Because the stress response is a whole-body physiological state evolved for physical emergencies, and running it continuously produces real effects in tissues that have nothing to do with

Question 3

What are pins and needles and why do they happen?

Accepted Answer

The medical term is paraesthesia, and the ordinary version is nerve signalling being disrupted and then recovering. When you sit on a foot or sleep on an arm, sustained pressure does two things: it

Question 4

Why must you fast before an operation?

Accepted Answer

To reduce the risk of aspiration — stomach contents entering the lungs while you are unconscious — which is uncommon and can be very serious when it happens. The mechanism. Awake, you have protective

Question 5

Why do some people faint at the sight of blood?

Accepted Answer

Because of a specific and unusual physiological response called the vasovagal reflex, and the pattern it follows is the opposite of what most people assume. The mechanism. Most frightening situations

Question 6

What is anaemia, and why is iron deficiency so common?

Accepted Answer

Anaemia is too little haemoglobin — the protein in red blood cells that carries oxygen — so tissues receive less oxygen than they need. It is a finding, not a diagnosis, and the important question is

Question 7

What actually happens in an allergic reaction?

Accepted Answer

The immune system misidentifies a harmless substance as a threat and mounts a defence against it — and the damage comes entirely from your own response, not from the substance itself. The mechanism,

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