LetsFIXtheNHS

In this in-depth episode, we sit down with Dr. Zainab Hussain — a GP partner, educator, and one of the most authentic medical voices emerging online — to explore what it’s really like to work inside the NHS today.

Zainab opens up about her early life growing up in Cardiff, inspired by hardworking parents, and takes us on her journey through medicine: from rotations in renal, spinal, mental health, and paediatrics, to building a career as a GP in Stoke-on-Trent.

This 90-minute conversation is a deep, human-centred exploration of general practice — its values, its challenges, and its future. We discuss digital access, patient expectations, workforce pressures, policy shifts, and the power of authentic connection between doctor and patient.

If you want to understand the heart of the NHS, this is where to start.

What We Discuss
  • Zainab’s upbringing and the family values that shaped her
  • Her path through multiple specialties before choosing general practice
  • The inner workings of GP practices — funding, partners, and incentives
  • The GP-patient relationship and why continuity of care matters
  • Phone queues, e-consults, and digital exclusion
  • Burnout, emigration, and the GP workforce crisis
  • The effect of policy churn and management overload on clinical care
  • The potential of AI and augmented intelligence in primary care
  • How we can better fund, respect, and empower general practice
  • Zainab’s social media journey — and why communication is clinical
  • Balancing medicine, motherhood, and meaning 
Links & Resources



Support the Movement

If you believe the NHS can — and must — be fixed, subscribe, share, and help us amplify the voices that matter. The solutions are out there. Let’s find them, together.

Creators and Guests

Host
Steve Podmore
Steve Podmore is a social entrepreneur, strategist, and founder of LetsFIXtheNHS — a media and engagement platform designed to drive innovation, investment, and reform in UK healthcare. Drawing on personal experience and decades of work at the intersection of policy, finance, and systems change, Steve launched LetsFIXtheNHS to bring courageous ideas and practical solutions to the forefront of public health.

What is LetsFIXtheNHS?

Let’s FIX the NHS is a bold new podcast exposing what’s broken in our health service — and spotlighting the people, innovations, and ideas that could save it.

From game-changing stroke treatments to frontline frustrations, we go beyond the headlines with the doctors, nurses, patients, policymakers, and pioneers who know the system best — and who aren’t afraid to challenge it.

Hosted by Steve Podmore, founder of LetsFIXtheNHS, this show blends courageous storytelling with real solutions - because saving lives shouldn’t be this hard.

Honest. Urgent. Unfiltered.

Subscribe now — and join the movement to transform healthcare.