Q: I’m 31, and am healthy, but I have terrible nightmares almost every night. I can wake up most nights several times in a state of terror. Sleeping tablets don’t help. Must I put up with these nightmares?

A: Night terrors like yours are a special type of sleep disturbance that needs specialist help: ordinary sleeping tablets, as you have found, don’t work. Your doctor may be able to pass you on to the regional sleep laboratory, where your sleep levels can be studied in detail, and where the doctors can organise sleep management for you, perhaps with a drug not normally dispensed by your family doctor.

Q: Three years ago I had radiotherapy, following which my hair fell out. Most of it has grown back now, but I still have patches of baldness. Will it ever come back completely?

A: I’m afraid it’s unlikely after this time, but your doctor may think of prescribing a minoxidil cream for you. It is put on twice daily for two weeks. If that doesn’t improve things, there is little point in continuing. Sorry.

Q: What is the latest about preventing peanut allergy in children? Should we eat them when pregnant, or avoid them?

A: The advice has changed. Cases of peanut allergy in children rose steeply in the first five years of this century, possibly because we advised against pregnant mothers eating them before that. In countries where that advice wasn’t given, peanut allergy cases have remained rare. So the advice in Britain is now to let pregnant women eat what they like. We will have to wait and see if this produces a fall in peanut allergy cases.

Q: I’ve had a pain in my back for weeks that my doctor calls lumbago. I can’t sit and it stops me from sleeping. When I put weight on my foot I get hip pain. I’ve tried painkillers, rubs and hot water bottles. What else can I do for myself?

A: Most back pain is caused by muscle spasms, and stretching exercises that you can do yourself may help. Keeping the small of your back hollow and stretching your spine regularly often reduces pain by relaxing the affected back muscles. But go back to your doctor, who may refer you to a physiotherapist, and examine you again to ensure that there is no internal or bony cause for the pain.