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I think people are by-and-large happy with the providers that they have got now. They treasure that doctor-patient relationship.

To become a doctor, you spend so much time in the tunnels of preparation - head down, trying not to screw up, trying to make it from one day to the next - that it is a shock to find yourself at the other end, with someone shaking your hand and asking how much money you want to make.

There are some fantastic, brilliant alternative doctors out there.

It's hard work, 'Doctor Who,' but let's be frank about it, I'm fortunate to be rewarded in the ways that I am. I don't just mean financially, I mean the nature of the part and everything that comes with it.

The vast majority of doctors really do try to take the money out of their minds. But to provide the best possible care requires using resources in a way that keeps you viable but improves the quality of care.

No young doctor nowadays can hope for work as exciting and rewarding.

I think doctors are really suffering now. They're suffering in the sense that they feel torn between serving their patients in the best way they can and dealing with all of requirements of the insurance companies and the HMOs and the hassles and the paper work and the increasing pressures to do less and less for their patients.

The fact of the matter is right now politicians and insurance companies are making decisions. We're saying we want doctors to be making decisions. And I think that will lead to a higher-quality, lower-cost system over time.

I have never described the time I was in Doctor Who as anything except a kind of ecstatic success, but all the rest has been rather a muddle and a disappointment. Compared to Doctor Who, it has been an outrageous failure really - it's so boring.

In addition to having a good partnership with a good doctor, you have to do some of the work yourself. Go online, read about it, and find out what you can tolerate.