Ahead of Indoor Allergy Week, Dr Christian Jessen offers his tips for coping with dust mites, getting a better night's sleep and overcoming his own health problems

It's not an especially embarrassing illness, but for TV's Dr Christian Jessen, having hay fever in high summer is an inconvenient one, because it rather gets in the way of filming.

"I developed hay fever really badly in my early 30s and it's a real problem when filming because I can have red itchy eyes, a blocked nose, and feel very wheezy," says the 37-year-old.

Although he's administered to hundreds of poorly people throughout his career, the dashing doctor, who fronts Embarrassing Bodies, rather sheepishly admits he's not his own best patient.

"We doctors are generally useless at treating ourselves and don't give ourselves the same care we would give to patients."

In fact, he reveals, he once almost died because he ignored appendicitis.

"There have been a number of occasions when I've neglected myself and I once got appendicitis. I got peritonitis (inflammation of the abdomen wall) through doing that, nearly died, and was in hospital for a week afterwards. I don't even remember the first two days after the anaesthetic...

"But it wasn't that I missed the appendicitis," he adds, quickly. "I diagnosed it, and knew exactly what it was, but, as a control freak, I'm terrified of the idea of an anaesthetic, and leaving other people completely in charge of you is my worst nightmare. So I simply hoped it would go away. I would never do this to a patient. If a patient had come to me in the state I was, I would have got them by the scruff of the neck, and marched them into hospital!"

The real reason Dr Jessen is laying his own history of illness bare is because he's campaigning to help other allergy sufferers get a better night's sleep by switching to woollen bedding. Apparently, according to The Wool Room and Allergy UK, whose Indoor Allergy Week runs from October 20, the natural fibre has a moisture management system which reduces the amount of house dust mites and other allergens.

"Allergies can develop at any time, and any age and, as a doctor, I realise they're an ever-increasing problem," says Dr Jessen. They can make patients miserable, take up a lot of GP time, and can be frustrating as often they're difficult to sort out.

"Symptoms from dust mite allergies include catarrh, runny nose and eyes, and they are difficult to avoid. But mites are unable to live in wool, so changing bedding and other things in the home to substitute for wool can be a real help. Medics love writing prescriptions for anti-histamines and inhalers but changing over to wool could be as effective at reducing symptoms."

Known for his taste in colourful shirts - he reckons there are around 800 in his wardrobe, and admits he's "never worn the same shirt twice in eight years" - he treated his own moderately embarrassing condition, hair loss, last year with implants a la Wayne Rooney. A bout of pneumonia in 2012 had left him thinning and he found himself the butt of some nasty jibes on Twitter, so he forked out £5,500 for a transplant of 3,000 hairs at a Manchester clinic.

"I was open about having that done because the attitude in the media towards male cosmetic procedures was just bizarre. It was like women could do whatever they wanted, but if men did it it was slightly exciting, very vain and a bit weird.

"It happened because I worked on the show with a surgeon who did transplants and there I was on the show helping people and advising people how to overcome issues they didn't like - a classic case, yet again, of a doctor ignoring himself and his own issue. So I thought, for once, I quite want to do this myself. It's very important to break the stigma about 'men don't do that sort of thing'."

But even though his hair's lustrous again, Dr Jessen is still not 100% happy all the time with the way he looks. He admits he suffers from a from of body dysmorphia that makes him think he's not as muscular as he is, so he works out more in the gym to hone his physique.

"It's an issue which I've always had, and I don't think it's generally understood by the public. What you see in the mirror is not how you really look, so I was always an academic, weedy, skinny looking kid and that is what I still see in the mirror on a bad day. The reaction to that is you tend to overly work out and exercise and try and build yourself up, but it's usually to a fairly excessive level, and you will still look in the mirror and see a weedy, weak physique.

"But TV has helped, it has given me a much greater sense of confidence in my own image. Although you can still have dark days, generally everyone's reaction to what they see is very positive, so that's affirming. I have dropped from working out five times a week and I'm not quite as fanatically obsessed about it, which means I'm getting more level and I am much more self-confident."

So confident in fact, that earlier this year, Dr Jessen opened up about his sexuality for a Channel 4 programme called Undercover Doctor: Cure Me, I'm Gay. His own idea, the show charted his search for a 'cure' for homosexuality.

"It was something I'd always wanted to do and felt very strongly about. I'd had people coming to me asking for treatments to be 'made straight' which I just found bizarre as a doctor and the personal side of me was obviously directly affected by this. So it was a coming together of both sides of me, the doctor and patient. I came into contact with some unpleasant people with unpleasant views and it was pretty harrowing at times, but it needed to be done.

"It's the thing I'm most proud of everything I've done, because it's been seen all around the world, shown in schools. Being gay shouldn't be treated in that way - it's something we should all grow up about.

"I was lucky because I had very educated, liberal parents, so it was never really an issue, we were left to be who we were," he adds. "I was always encouraged and supported. There were moments when I felt left out and lonely because everyone else was getting girlfriends at school, but all kids go through periods of self-doubt and life could have been a lot worse, and is a lot worse for some kids."

Looking back to his younger self, Dr Jessen says he would give the teenage him just one piece of advice: "Make sure you are happy and that what you are doing, working at, is something that you absolutely love doing. My work doesn't feel like work and for that reason I rarely take holidays because I love it so much."

Dr Christian's Top 10 Tips To Better Sleep:

1. Ensure you're well hydrated before you go to sleep.

2. Don't have any caffeine after 6pm if you want to sleep well.

3. Turn your iPad and phones off an hour before you want to sleep. Technology and sleep don't mix.

4. Try reading a book before sleep.

5. Ensure there's good ventilation in your bedroom.

6. Reduce the amount of light in your room. If you can, invest in black-out blinds.

7. If you're a light sleeper, invest in some good ear plugs to cancel out any annoying sounds that might disturb your sleep.

8. Sleeping with wool bedding is the best way to reduce symptoms of skin and respiratory allergies.

9. Wool will absorb the 1 litre of water that the average person perspires every night and then desorb naturally back to its normal state during the day. Synthetic bedding traps moisture, thereby creating the right environment for the food source of house dust mites, which can also cause overheating.

10. If you're going through that time of life, ladies, sleeping with wool will help with hot flushes, as wool helps to regulate your body temperature. Similarly, if you're pregnant and hot at night, sleep with wool.

Dr Christian is supporting The Wool Room's campaign to help give everyone a good night's sleep. For more information, visit www.thewoolroom.com