Health chat with Dr Anthony R Leeds
Title: ‘Concluding conversation between Dr Anthony Leeds and Sami Malik’
In this episode Sami Malik talks to Anthony Leeds to Seek his Impressions after preparing this fourth series of talks.
Dr Leeds expressed appreciation for the large loyal audience that had developed and noted that while the focus was on the audience in South Asia there was also a large audience in the USA, Canada and the UK, South America and the Middle East. He also said that as a result of the talks there was clarity about what needed to be done next.
When asked what he would like to see next in the UK, Dr Leeds noted that some very good results from the NHS England diabetes remission program had just been published confirming that delivery of that type of programmer was a practical option. Leeds noted that since it was now proven that it could be delivered for diabetes remission it could also be delivered for other obesity-related comorbidities such as osteoarthritis, sleep apnoea, and cardiovascular disease. He said that a feasibility study on use of a package of care including weight loss with 800kcal/d formula diet, muscle strengthening exercises, analgesia optimization and orthotics* in osteoarthritis had been done by colleagues in Edinburgh and Leeds. In view of the large number of people waiting for knee and hip surgery this type of interim medical management should be introduced now while those people waited for surgery. This topic was discussed in Series 3 episode by Prof Hamish Simpson from Edinburgh University.
Sami Malik then asked what should be done next in South Asia. Noting that diabetes rates were variable in South Asian countries but particularly high in Pakistan, Leeds said that he’d like to see a diabetes remission program developed for Pakistan. A lot of preparatory work had been done in other countries that showed that people of all ethnicities and from all countries were able to lose enough weight with the formula diet program to give a high probability of diabetes remission, thus delivering this in Pakistan should be possible.
Other program in the series had considered nutrition and eye health. His conversations with John Nolan from Waterford in Ireland had established that supplementation with the carotenoids was beneficial for eye health and likely to slow the progress of age related macular degeneration. The big next step would be a multi-centre multi-country clinical trial lasting several years. The anti-oxidant properties of the carotenoids may also extend to delivering a benefit to brain health as was discussed with Prof Mulcahy, also from Waterford. Again large scale clinical trials were needed.
Asked if he was looking for funding, Dr Leeds said that like all other academics a large part of his life had been spent raising funding and yes, there was a great need for funding for trials that could translate these findings into practice fairly quickly: diabetes remission in Pakistan, weight loss in osteoarthritis in the UK, carotenoids for a age-related macular degeneration and potentially for dementia in multi-country studies.
Sami Malik concluded by asking Dr Leeds if there would be a fifth series of ‘Health chats’ and Leeds replied that if this was requested then there were several more speakers lined up and willing to participate, so yes, a fifth series would be possible.
*orthotics: a device, usually a shoe or heel insert individually designed to improve walking.
Links to previous topics (text under each video provides links to websites linked to subject):
Age-related macular degeneration:
Brain health – healthy choices:
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