My BodyFix review: Kathryn Thomas is empathetic as serious health issues shared

Hypochondriacs will be ready to dive behind the couch throughout Kathryn Thomas’s new series, My BodyFix (RTÉ One, 8.30pm). It’s health television meets Keanu Reeves’s The Matrix – which feels odd in the abstract and even more unlikely on the screen. And that’s before you factor in those squeamish viewers who’d rather walk barefoot on Lego than see a CGI rendering of an icky ticker – and will clench their teeth upon hearing 6,000 people have heart attacks in Ireland each year.

The big concept is that individuals requiring crucial medical procedures are given an up-close look at their faulty body parts via a virtual reality (VR) headset. In episode one, we meet 66-year-old Frank Walsh, who, having just recovered from prostate cancer, now requires heart surgery.

The problem is a malfunctioning heart valve. He has no option but to go under the knife. “The people who get to have surgery are the lucky ones,” says consultant cardiothoracic surgeon Sarah Early at St James’s Hospital, Dublin. “There are some who are untreatable, which is really unfortunate.”

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Frank is phlegmatic and seems keen to discover more about his heart. So he pops on a headset and is treated to a 3D rendering of the organ, complete with that problematic valve. “We don’t have an option,” says his wife, Irene. “You either go for surgery or walk up a hill and collapse.”

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Seeing a family member wheeled into an operating theatre is not an experience to be wished on anyone, and you feel for Irene as Frank says his farewells (his operation carries a 3 per cent chance of death). But while the story is undeniably moving, it is hard to understand how his health issues are illuminated by the 3D component – which only takes up a brief segment of the running time and feels irrelevant to Frank’s journey back to wellness.

Look past the gimmicks, and My BodyFix tells the compelling story of ordinary people facing existential health issues

Thomas brings her familiar enthusiasm. Though she had gotten her start presenting travel show No Frontiers, she is arguably best known for her stint fronting Operation Transformation. She conjures the same effusiveness on My BodyFix and walks the difficult path of being upbeat while showing huge empathy with Frank as he goes for his operation.

You wonder whether the formula needed more tweaking before going to the screen, however. Look past the gimmicks, and My BodyFix tells the compelling story of ordinary people facing existential health issues. But the VR feels OTT: My BodyFix would surely be better without it.