One picks up tip: nurse on medical programme (8)
I believe the answer is:
listener
'medical programme' is the definition.
Although both the answer and definition are singular nouns, I don't see how one could define the other.
'one picks up tip nurse' is the wordplay.
'one' becomes 'lister' (I can't justify this - if you can you should believe this answer much more).
'picks up' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'tip' says to hollow out the word (remove centre letters) (I've seen 'tips of' mean this).
'nurse' with its middle taken out is 'ne'.
'lister' enclosing 'ne' is 'LISTENER'.
'on' acts as a link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for listener that I've seen before include "One being attentive to sounds" , "Hearer" , "Tough crossword" , "Former BBC magazine" , "One giving attention" .)