David Le Couteur

David Le Couteur is Professor of Geriatric Medicine and Director of the Centre for Education and Research on Ageing at the University of Sydney, and Senior Staff Specialist Physician in Geriatric Medicine at the Concord Repatriation General Hospital in Sydney. His interests are biogerontology, hepatology and aging, nutrition and aging, and geriatric pharmacology.

In 2016 he was awarded an AO (Officer of the Order of Australia) for distinguished service to medicine as a clinical pharmacologist and geriatrician, particularly through a range of advisory roles and academic research activities. In October 2017 he was elected a fellow of the Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences. Academic metrics include approx. 400 publications and chapters; more than 20,000 citations; scholar H index 67; Web of Science H index 54; 24 Australian NHMRC and ARC research grants (>$26 million continuous funding over 26 years); and 32 post-graduate research students (22 completed PhD, 1 current PhD).

He was president of the Australasian Society of Clinical and Experimental Pharmacologists and Toxicologists (ASCEPT 2011-2013). He is on the International Advisory Panel of the journal ‘Age and Ageing’, Editor in Chief of the Journal of Gerontology Biological Sciences (2018-2022), associate editor of the Journal of Gerontology Medical Sciences. He was recipient of the American Society for Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics 2013 William B Abrams award (for contribution to geriatric clinical pharmacology); 2015 Rand Medal of the Australasian Society of Clinical and Experimental Pharmacologists and Toxicologists (for contribution to national and international pharmacology); 2017 Arthur E Mills Memorial Oration RACP; and 2018 Distinguished Professorial Achievement Award, Faculty of Medicine University of Sydney.

He served on several Australian Federal medicines committees: the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee (2009-2013) and chaired its Drug Utilization Subcommittee; the Australian Drug Evaluation Committee (1998-2005) and chaired its Pharmaceutical Subcommittee; and the Advisory Committee on the Safety of Medicines (2013-2015). He has served on several education and training committees in the Royal Australasian College of Physicians and is a board member of the Australian Medicines Handbook.

His research is translational gerontology, spanning from biogerontology (nutrition, liver pharmacology and physiology, liver endothelium and ageing); clinical research (geriatric pharmacology and the application of evidence based medicine to older people) and epidemiology (chief investigator and pharmacoepidemiologist on the Concord Health and Ageing Male Project CHAMP). His laboratory research is undertaken at the ANZAC Research Institute and the Charles Perkins Centre.
Country: Australia
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