Episode 8

This episode takes a look at the country's single biggest killer, heart disease. Every day 282 people will have a heart attack and 200 will die. In Manchester, a specialist team race to treat a steady stream of heart attack victims, some of whom have a 20 year history of heart disease. In Liverpool six-month-old Kyran undergoes open heart surgery to correct a defect first detected in the womb and in Yorkshire, air ambulance paramedics attempt to resuscitate an 80-year-old mechanic who has collapsed while working on a neighbour's car.

Despite improvements in treatment, our increasingly sedentary lifestyle combined with an ageing population will only add to the pressure on the NHS, a dilemma playing out across the whole organisation as demands increase and the money to pay for it doesn't.