Undoctored: The brand new No 1 Sunday Times bestseller from the author of 'This Is Going To Hurt’

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Yes – I was drawn by the obvious highs of the labour ward, never thinking about the lows that come alongside it. I loved the highs and couldn’t cope with the lows. Perhaps something more outpatient- or primary care-based. Most of my close relatives are GPs and although general practice has never been harder, my personality would have been better suited to it. You’re made health secretary tomorrow. Truss won’t give you any more money. What’s the very first thing you will do? THIS IS GOING TO HURT was the bestselling non-fiction book of the century – a frank, funny and furious look at the brutal realities of life in the NHS. Do you feel any guilt about leaving the NHS and finding fame by monetising the experiences that all NHS doctors live through and still experience on a daily basis, despite not working as an NHS doctor for more than a decade? The NHS is trying to persuade former clinicians to return to the profession. What would it take to persuade you to swap your pen for a stethoscope?

And things are now better – they are not better enough, there’s still a long way to go – but it’s a big ship to steer.’ There is an emphasis on wellbeing in hospitals but when you dig into it, it often just amounts to a Zumba class. A recent report published by the GMC intended to improve support for the mental health of doctors but its recommendations were not taken on board by the government. People have a huge problem with seeking help. There is always the feeling that if you speak to someone, word will get out. There needs to be a culture, in medicine, that is less militaristic where people can talk openly. Juniors should be able to tell their bosses when they’re struggling, bosses should actively look out for their juniors. All staff should know where they can turn and trust they can get help that will not compromise their careers (at the moment, you are almost taught that doctors should not struggle).Behind Kay’s intensely critical voice – the one I objected to in This Is Going to Hurt, when it faced his female patients – the voice that whirrs on, presumably full time in his head, is his mother’s. Perhaps it is artistic licence, perhaps exaggeration, but he presents his mother as intensely critical, oblivious to his pain. Though medicine broke him, she yearned for him to return to it, as if she could not hear. He needed a microphone.

Stand-up is both diagnosis of pain and cure: the fury and the laughter that soothes it. I’m not surprised he wanted to bring babies into the world: he is all in pieces. I now see Kay’s attempt at medicine as a great act of transference: to heal others at the expense of himself; to birth others who would be happier than himself, in a kind of thwarted renewal. Comedy is Kay’s forte but, as the first memoir related, he hung up his stethoscope after a tragic event: one of his patients lost her baby because of an unforeseen complication with her pregnancy and had to go into ICU for an emergency hysterectomy – and while it was not his fault, he felt it to be his responsibility and the catastrophic nature of it affected him profoundly. On the strength of talking to him, I’d say it still does.The writer was flattered by the interest in a second potential series of This Is Going To Hurt, starring Ben Whishaw, but said it was written as ‘a one and done’ (Picture: BBC/Sister/Anika Molnar)

The thing that I thought as soon as I started watching the rushes come together, and then a bunch of doctors have said to me, is I can’t believe they’re not actually doctors, midwives and nurses, because they just embodied it so well. I think Ambika in particular, for someone who had basically done practically nothing on-screen before – she’s just such an intelligent, nuanced actor.’ MORE : Simon Callow reflects on the enduring popularity of Four Weddings and a Funeral: ‘The cast knew it would be our fault if it wasn’t a success’Speaking of Whishaw, Kay is of course a fan of the actor cast to play the fictionalised version of Adam (who the author reminds us isn’t really him). The most distressing part of the book is his description of being raped in a sauna in New Zealand. He cut this episode out “about 20 times” before steeling himself to go ahead with it. The clincher, once again, was the hope that including it might help others to seek help. He puts his head briefly in his hands. “I know it will cause me grief in all sorts of ways. I know what social media is like, I know I’m going to have to answer questions about it for ever. But I was writing a book about being honest … Time will tell if it was the right decision.” I think if I hadn’t done medicine, I’d probably have been a musician. Medicine insists that you have all these extracurricular interests and for me, that was mostly music and I really loved music. I wonder if I’d be writing for the piano right now, writing dots rather than writing words.’