{"type":"rich","version":"1.0","provider_name":"Transistor","provider_url":"https://transistor.fm","author_name":"The Method - Health in the Real World","title":"The case for compassion: why social connection is an underrated health hack, with Dr. Julian Abel","html":"","width":"100%","height":180,"duration":3188,"description":"Conversations on health often centre around what to eat, how to move, when to sleep… But there’s a health lever most of us tend to overlook: social connection. \nIn 2016, the Frome Project, a Somerset-based research initiative, found that we could reduce emergency hospital admissions by 14%, not with a miracle drug, but with more intentional community connections. \n\nThis week, Greg and Charlie sit down with one of the minds behind this project: Dr. Julian Abel. Julian has spent his clinical career as a palliative care consultant, sitting with people at the very end of their lives, an experience that set him on a path to lead remarkable research into how relationships can measurably improve our health. Today, he is the director of a charity called Compassionate Communities UK and a public health specialist on the science of social connection.\n\nIn this conversation, Julian shares the story behind the Frome Project, and helps us understand how compassion can be a tool to improve the healthcare system and our social life more broadly. The science section takes us deep into the biology of social connection: how loneliness and social isolation change our gene expression, suppress our immune systems, and drive inflammation. You’ll also find out how relationships can reverse that process.\nIn the practice segment, Julian turns the tables and asks Charlie and Greg what their relationship to community is. They discuss the every day activities that bring them joy, and Julian demonstrates how new connections can be woven into existing routines. We get into:\nWhat connection feels like and how to magnify it in existing habits (25:53)\nIs modern life getting in the way of building meaningful relationships? (30:18)\nWhy third spaces and organised group activities are fertile grounds for social connection (32:35)\nFinally, in the experience section, we hear from listeners navigating some of the most sensitive versions of this challenge. A mum in London who has watched her social world...","thumbnail_url":"https://img.transistorcdn.com/c6ypnx0JQE1JWxTnltulvgV2WOBVgiujrfWR7NGWuFo/rs:fill:0:0:1/w:400/h:400/q:60/mb:500000/aHR0cHM6Ly9pbWct/dXBsb2FkLXByb2R1/Y3Rpb24udHJhbnNp/c3Rvci5mbS80YjM5/NmQzNmM1MTQ3M2Zi/ZWFhZmU2NzQ3MDNm/ZjU5MC5qcGc.webp","thumbnail_width":300,"thumbnail_height":300}