Conditions

The eardrum is a membrane a tenth of a millimetre thick, stretched across the far end of the ear canal.

The heart sits inside a thin two-layered sac called the pericardium. A little fluid between its leaves lets the heart glide with every beat.

A period is the shedding of the lining of the womb, which repeats roughly once a month from the teenage years until the menopause.

Peripheral arterial disease is a narrowing of the arteries that carry blood to the legs. The cause is nearly always the same: cholesterol-rich plaques build…

Peripheral neuropathy is damage to the nerves running from the spinal cord to the arms, legs and internal organs.

The peritoneum is a thin, moist membrane that lines the abdomen from the inside and wraps around the bowel, the liver and the spleen.

In Peyronie's disease the penis bends during an erection because a patch of scar has formed in its outer sheath.

A phaeochromocytoma is a rare tumour of the adrenal gland that makes stress hormones of its own accord.

Phlebitis is inflammation of a vein running just under the skin. A small clot almost always forms inside that vein at the same time, which is why the…

Everyone has haemorrhoids: they are cushions of blood vessels in the wall of the anal canal that help hold the bowel contents in.