Melanie Sykes has shared that she has been experiencing heart issues and alopecia triggered by “PTSD from the TV industry”.
The 54-year-old TV presenter, who left mainstream broadcasting in 2021, shared a photograph of a bald spot on her head, writing: “This is a pic of me I took last week whilst in London investigating some health issues.”
“I am experiencing alopecia and heart issues due to all that has happened over the last few months. PTSD, shock, mistreatment and malpractice.”
In a further post shared on her YouTube channel, Sykes said she developed an irregular heartbeat and “rapid” hair loss when the press began “harassing” her when allegations surfaced against TV chef Gino D’Acampo, whom she worked with on the ITV series Let’s Do Lunch with Gino and Mel alongside D’Acampo from 2011 to 2014.
“I went into the New Year with so much energy. I’ve slowed things down because I got a heart problem, which I developed during the whole Gino D’Acampo bull**** that happened in the news,” Sykes said in the video. “And suddenly, the stress levels in my life shot up because I left that industry years ago but it won’t leave me alone.”
“It’s all been triggered – and everybody’s agreed with this – by my PTSD from the industry.”
She said: “I am experiencing alopecia in quite a significant way. I have lost inches off my hairline at the back. I have probably got half my hair at the moment.”
“I’ve lost an eyebrow pretty much. I’m clinging to half of one.”
Sykes said that, while experiencing these health issues, she has been let down by the UK’s “broken” medical system, saying that she has felt “undermined” by medical professionals within both NHS and private services.
She said on Instagram: “This country must do better, and get better. Our health services are utterly shocking bar a few and rare decent humans who listen without prejudice and judgement. It is a lottery who you will encounter and how that experience can play out.”
Sykes said in the YouTube video that she feels like medical professionals have treated her like she is “thick” once they found out that she has autism and ADHD, which she was diagnosed with in 2021.
The presenter said that doctors have attributed her heart condition to “old age” and diminished the fact that she is “struggling”.
“I’ve copied all the emails of everybody that sent me some unethical approaches and the way that people speak to you,” she said.
Sykes has said that due to her health condition, she cannot have anyone in her life who brings her “friction or bad energy because it will stress me and [my heart rate] will go up”.
On her YouTube channel, Sykes describes that she has been on an “epic voyage of self-discovery” since leaving broadcasting and being diagnosed with autism and ADHD. She published a book in 2023 called Illuminated: Autism and All The Things I Left Unsaid, about her period of mental breakthrough.
When the D’Acampo allegations came to light earlier this year, Skyes said in a YouTube video: “I feel like I was in a war zone in that industry – 24 years of battling through an industry that didn’t feel right to me anyway.”
She also urged TV bosses to “clean house” while spending time “cleaning up” presenters she called “misogynistic” – and said that “the industry creates monsters”.
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“If you’re spending all your time cleaning up people’s s***, just clean the house. Clean out the house and start again. That’s all I’m saying,” Sykes added.
D’Acampo has denied claims that he made sexualised comments and gestures to female employees behind the scenes of his popular programmes.
He said in February: “I have never been made aware of these matters previously and the allegations are firmly denied. I would not do anything that I thought would upset or distress anyone. This is simply not in my nature. I do not recognise the version of events being put to me.
“Not only have these allegations never been raised with me before, I have been repeatedly supported by executives at the highest level and was commissioned on prime-time programmes during the period in which it is now suggested I was acting inappropriately.”
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