Biography

The aim of my work is to reduce the number of patients dying uneccessarily from liver disease. Liver mortality has increased fourfold since 1980 as a result of changes in the alcohol marketplace - essentially cheaper stronger alcohol. Although in-hospital liver mortality rates have fallen as a result of improving therapies, these improvements have not translated into increased long term survival with the major factor being late diagnosis. Most patients are unaware that they have cirrhosis until they are admitted as an emergency with severe complications. Liver medicine is stuck in the 20th century and needs to change to be fit for the problems of the 21st century namely - the commercially mediated diseases of unhealthy environments, and unhealthy behaviours.