Singapore, Singapore
25/11/2021 – 26/11/2021
9:00 am – 12:40 pm
MD11, CRC Auditorium, National University of Singapore
Globally, life expectancy has markedly increased due to declining infant mortality rates and lower mortality from infectious disease, medical advancements, better chronic disease management and socioeconomic progress. While global life expectancy may have increased, this has not always translated to living in good health even as we live longer. A rapidly aging and unhealthy population is a worrying prospect as the greatest asset for a country is its people.
In the face of these challenges, a fundamental shift towards health promotion and disease prevention is critical. Prioritizing health and wellness goals should start at the early stage and throughout the life course. An individual’s advantage in an increasingly competitive and globalized society also hinges on its ability to learn fast, be adaptable and perform to one’s full potential. This raises the important question of how we can better prepare ourselves in the coming years?
This symposium will dive into the key elements of optimizing one’s health, wellness and potential over our life course, supported by the surrounding environment and the application of innovative technologies.
Objectives:
- Present current scientific evidence and the synergistic relationship of physical activity, nutrition, sleep and mental health
- Discuss nutritional, mental and health strategies in optimizing health, wellness and potential at different life stages
- Understand the role and impact of the environment on health, lifestyle and behavior
- Discuss the use of cutting-edge AI technology and innovations in translating health outcomes
- Share efforts to promote a healthy and active living agenda for the population
Registration
Key Information
This event will be hosted in a hybrid format (In-person & virtual).
In the new normal, we are providing a unique opportunity for you to ATTEND IN-PERSON OR VIRTUALLY!
If you are in Singapore, we encourage you to join us in-person for this engaging experience, where safe distancing measures will be in place to keep everyone safe.
Ensuring the health and well being of our attendees and staffs remain our top priority. The Safe Management Measures (SMMs) at the Workplace has been put in place to ensure that the event is conducted in a safe manner.
For individuals in Singapore who wish to attend in-person:
- In-person registration is on first come-first serve basis
- As we have limited seats for in-person attendees, please register early
- Your in-person registration will only be confirmed by the ILSI SEA Region Secretariat
- After this date and time, only virtual attendee registrations will be accepted.
For individuals who wish to attend virtually:
- Please register early before the registration closes on November 24, 2021, 5.30pm Singapore Time.
Key Information (In-person Attendees)
After Registration
Please allow ILSI SEA Region Secretariat 3-5 working days to process your registration. You will receive an email from us to confirm your registration.
Kindly note that this event is held at MD11, CRC Auditorium at National University of Singapore
On the Event Day
The onsite registration will start at 8.15am Singapore Time. At the MD11 building entrance, please do the following before entry:
a. Perform SafeEntry check-in using TraceTogether mobile app (please note that TraceTogether token is not accepted)
b. Scan for NUS Visitor Registration
Then, proceed to the Registration counter and our staff will assist you.
The following measures must be strictly observed at all times:
- Face mask must be worn throughout the event
- No eating in the auditorium is allowed
- At least 1m safe distancing must be observed between individuals
- No handshakes or other forms of physical contact is allowed
*Please note that walk-ins are not allowed
If you have any enquiries on this event, please contact ILSI SEA Region Secretariat at event@ilsisea.org.sg
Key Information (Virtual Attendees)
After Registration
Attendees will receive the Zoom Confirmation email upon successful registration. If you did not receive it, please contact ILSI SEA Region Secretariat at event@ilsisea.org.sg
You will receive email reminders 1 day, 1 week and 1 hour before the start of the event.
If you have any enquiries on this event, please contact ILSI SEA Region Secretariat at event@ilsisea.org.sg
Meet the Experts
Day 1
Mr. Geoffry Smith is President of ILSI Southeast Asia Region based in Singapore, and a Representative of the branch to the ILSI Global Assembly. He is also the Chairman of the Essential Micronutrients Foundation, a non-profit organization which addresses micronutrient deficiencies globally as a public health issue. In addition, he is Director of Nutrition Strategies International which deals with food and nutrition issues in developing countries. Mr. Smith serves as a member of the editorial board of the journal Food and Nutrition Bulletin. Prior to his current positions, Mr. Smith was the Global Director, Health Chelates for Akzo Nobel Functional Chemicals, and directed the global business for these compounds in food and nutrition as well as pharmaceutical applications. He was responsible for the global project within Akzo Nobel addressing iron deficiency anemia.
Mr. Smith directed the Asia Pacific activities for Akzo Nobel’s Innovation Unit. He is a thirty-year veteran of the chemical industry in the Asia Pacific and has resided in Singapore for more than 25 years. He is a Member of the Nutrition Society of the UK, the American Society of Nutrition, and the American Chemical Society.
Prof. Reshma Taneja is Head of the Department of Physiology at the National University of Singapore in Singapore. Her own laboratory, initially at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City, and now at the National University of Singapore, has a long-standing interest in understanding skeletal muscle biology and its de-regulation in human myopathies. She has published her work in high profile journals and serves on many editorial boards as well as grant review panels locally and internationally.
She has received multiple awards including a Scholar Award from the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society in the USA; as well as Faculty Research, Teaching and Mentoring Awards in Singapore. She got her Ph.D. degree from the Indian Institute of Science and did her postdoctoral training in the laboratory of Prof Pierre Chambon at the IGBMC in France.
Dr. Hock Woon Chiang is Deputy Chief Executive Officer of Sport Singapore in Singapore. He initiated the nation-wide Active Health social movement that aims to transform the way Singaporeans manage their health and physical well-being. Working closely with like-minded partners, Active Health has established an ecosystem of Active Health Lab network in various parts of Singapore to better serve the needs of the community. He also leads the organization’s push towards digital transformation and human capital transformation efforts.
Assoc. Prof. Melody Ding is Associate Professor at School of Public Health, Faculty of Medicine at the University of Sydney in Australia. She is internationally recognised for her research in physical activity, behavioural epidemiology and chronic disease prevention research, evidenced by more than 170 published papers and more than 9000 citations.
She led the 2016 and 2021 Lancet Series on Physical Activity and Health and was the recipient of the 2018 NSW Young Tall Poppy of the Year and 2019 Eureka Prize Emerging Leader in Science. She is the recipient of an National Health and Medical Research Council Emerging Leader grant in 2021 and her career has been profiled by the Lancet (https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(21)01417-3/fulltext ). Her work has informed policies, guidelines, and practices around the world and has received extensive media coverage, reaching more than a billion people from around the world.
As an advocate for physical activity, Melody enjoys yoga, dance, high-intensity interval training and ocean swim. She commutes by bike to work and is proud for the minimal carbon emission and air pollution associated with her travels.
Asst. Prof. Mary Chong is Assistant Professor at the Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health at National University of Singapore. She is also Principal Investigator at the Singapore Institute for Clinical Sciences, A*STAR.
She is the Nutrition Lead for the Growing Up in Singapore Towards Healthy Outcomes (GUSTO) study, a mother-offspring cohort study in Singapore and is involved in two pre-conception studies, SPRESTO and NiPPeR.
She was trained as a clinical dietitian. Her main research is on Maternal and Child Nutrition. Asst Prof. Chong has a special interest in diet and lifestyle behaviours and has been researching in this area with web-based technologies in both children and adults. Her current work includes investigating behavioural determinants of health in children, from which her team has developed a web-based, time-use application (MEDAL) to assess diet and lifestyle in school children.
She has been invited to speak at national and international conferences and has published over 150 papers in peer-reviewed journals. She is currently a member of the Advisory Panel on Parenting for the Ministry of Social and Family development and a committee member for the Physical Education Syllabus Review and Development, Ministry of Education. She attained her PhD at the University of Oxford, United Kingdom.
Prof. Michael Chia is a full Professor of Education at the National Institute of Education in Singapore. His graduate and post-graduate training emanated from Loughborough University (BSc Hons 1st class, Physical Education & Sports Science) and Exeter University (PhD, Health & Exercise Sciences) in the UK. His professional credentials include certifications from American College of Sports Medicine, British Association of Sport and Exercise Science and the Outward Bound School in Hong Kong.
As an academic, he received several awards for his teaching, research and leadership roles. He leads an international research on screen media use, physical activity, and sleep among preschool children with 20 countries in Asia, Europe and the USA (iissaar.com). In recent times, his research featured on BBC World Service and the Straits Times in Singapore. He enjoys his work and his play tremendously, oftentimes, confusing work and play as the same. Like many Singaporeans, he could do with more sleep!
Prof. Mark Hargreaves is Professor of Physiology at the University of Melbourne in Australia. He is a Fellow of the American College of Sports Medicine, of Exercise and Sports Science Australia and the American Physiological Society.
As Pro Vice-Chancellor (Research Partnerships & Infrastructure) at Melbourne, he has oversight of the internal initiatives that foster interdisciplinary research, the important research relationships with external partners, and research infrastructure within the University.
His research and teaching interests focus on the physiological and metabolic responses to acute and chronic exercise, with an emphasis on carbohydrate metabolism and GLUT4 expression. He is a Consulting Editor for Journal of Applied Physiology, an Associate Editor for Comprehensive Physiology and serves on the editorial board of Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise. He was a Board Director of the Victorian Institute of Sport 2004-2019 and currently serves on the Board of the Florey Institute of Neuroscience and Mental Health.
He has B.Sc. (Physiology - 1982) and Ph.D. (Physiology - 1989) degrees from the University of Melbourne and an MA (Exercise Physiology - 1984) from Ball State University (USA).
Assoc. Prof. Jason Lee is the Deputy Director of the Human Potential Translational Research Programme, Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine and the Research Programme Lead on Heat Heath and Work Productivity at the Global Asia Institute, National University of Singapore.
He is an exercise and thermal physiologist, and a Fellow of the American College of Sports Medicine. He serves in various national and international panels related to human performance and safety. Assoc. Prof. Lee’s main research interests are in fluid balance, thermoregulation and mitigation strategies for improving human performance. He studies the physiological demands associated with passive and exertional heat stress and how humans adapt to ensure optimal performance and survival. The knowledge gained from his research has also benefitted several other governmental agencies. Assoc. Prof. Lee completed his 12-year tenure at the DSO National Laboratories in 2018 by directing the Human Performance Programme in his final appointment.
Assoc. Prof. Lee chaired the National Work Group on Heat Stress Guidelines for Workers and leads the Scientific Committee on Thermal Factors at the International Commission on Occupational Health. He is also a member of the WHO and WMO Report on Climate Change on Workers’ Health and Productivity, the National Heat Index-Physical Activity Expert Panel and the Singapore Physical Activity Guidelines Advisory Committee.
Assoc. Prof. Falk Mueller-Riemenschneider is Associate Professor at the Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health at the National University of Singapore in Singapore. He qualified as a medical doctor from the University of Cologne in Germany and subsequently worked in General Medicine and Cardiology at the Royal London Hospital and Oxford Radcliffe University Hospitals, United Kingdom. He completed a doctorate at the University of Cologne and a Master’s degree in Public Health at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.
Assoc. Prof. Mueller-Riemenschneider ’s work focuses on health promotion and the prevention of non-communicable diseases, with a particular emphasis on physical activity and movement behaviors among children and adults, as well as the application of digital technologies in public health research.
Day 2
Prof. Dean Ho is the Provost’s Chair Professor, Director of The N.1 Institute for Health (N.1), Director of The Institute for Digital Medicine (WisDM) and Head of the Department of Biomedical Engineering at the National University of Singapore in Singapore.
Prof. Ho and collaborators successfully developed and validated CURATE.AI, a powerful digital medicine platform that has optimized human treatment for broad indications ranging from oncology to infectious diseases. He co-led the first inhuman clinical trials that have resulted in completely halted disease progression and durable patient responses that substantially outperformed standard of care approaches.
Prof. Ho is a Fellow of the US National Academy of Inventors (NAI), the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE), and the Royal Society of Chemistry. He was also recently named to the HIMSS Future50 Class of 2021 for his internationally recognized leadership in digital health. His discoveries have been featured on CNN, The Economist, National Geographic, Forbes, Washington Post, NPR and other international news outlets. Prof. Ho is also a Subgroup Lead in the World Health Organization (WHO)-ITU AI for Health Working Group for Regulatory Considerations.
Prof. Ho is a recipient of the Tech Heroes from Crisis Pathfinder Award from the Singapore Computer Society, NSF CAREER Award, Wallace H. Coulter Foundation Translational Research Award, and V Foundation for Cancer Research Scholar Award, among others. He has also served as the President of the Board of Directors of the Society for Laboratory Automation and Screening (SLAS), a 26,000+ member global drug development organization.
Prof. Brian Kennedy is a Distinguished Professor in Biochemistry and Physiology at the Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine at National University Singapore and serves as Director of (1) the Centre for Healthy Longevity at the National University Health System, (2) the Healthy Longevity Translational Research Programme, and (3) the Asian Centre for Reproductive Longevity and Equality. Collectively, NUS aging research seeks to demonstrate that longevity interventions can be successfully employed in humans to extend healthspan, the disease-free and highly functional period of life.
Prof. Brian Kennedy is internationally recognized for his research in the basic biology of aging and as a visionary committed to translating research discoveries into new ways of detecting, delaying, preventing and treating human aging and associated diseases.
From 2010 to 2016, Prof. Kennedy was the President and CEO of the Buck Institute for Research on Aging and he maintained a professorship there through 2020. Prof. Kennedy has an adjunct appointments at the Department of Biochemistry at the University of Washington, where he was a faculty member from 2001 to 2010. In addition, Prof. Kennedy is also actively involved with a number of Biotechnology companies. In addition, Prof. Kennedy serves as a Co-Editor-In-Chief at Aging Cell. Finally, Prof. Kennedy has a track record of interaction in China, where he was a Visiting Professor at the Aging Research Institute at Guangdong Medical College from 2009 to 2014. His Ph.D. was performed in the laboratory of Leonard Guarente at M.I.T., where he published the first paper linking Sirtuins to aging.
Assoc. Prof. Reshma Merchant is the Head and Senior Consultant for the Division of Geriatric Medicine at the National University Hospital in Singapore. She is a strong advocate for ageing in place and age-friendly healthcare system. Prior to this, she was the Head of Division of Advanced Internal Medicine and under her leadership, the division made great progress in care integration, care coordination and new models of care including acute medical unit and Innovation-42. She graduated from the University of Edinburgh and obtained her postgraduate qualification from the Royal College of Physicians, London, in 1999, where she worked for several years before returning to Singapore in 2001.
She is a member of WHO Global Network on Long-term care (GNLTC), and recognised as a thought leader and special expert in policy, research and practice in fields associated with population ageing by International Federation on Ageing. She also holds many leadership positions in national and professional organisations and advisory boards including the National Kidney Foundation and clinical lead for Institutional Community Collaborations (ICC), Regional Health System Planning Office. She has won multiple teaching awards, and her main areas of research interests are in sarcopenia, falls prevention, frailty and healthy ageing in community dwelling older adults. She is well published and has many ongoing projects on healthy ageing, and falls prevention.
Prof. Philip Newsholme is Teaching and Research Professor in the Curtin Medical School at Curtin University in Perth, Australia. He was previously the Head of School, Biomedical Sciences, at the same university (September 2011 – December 2017). He obtained his B.Sc. and D. Phil. in Biochemistry from the Universities of Birmingham and Oxford in United Kingdom, respectively. His research interests are in the disciplines of metabolic biochemistry and molecular nutrition.
Before taking up his present position in Australia, he worked at University College Dublin, Ireland, in the fields of biochemistry, biomedical science, nutrition and sports science. He moved to UCD Dublin in 1993 as a Lecturer in Biochemistry and received a promotion to Senior Lecturer in Biochemistry in 2002, Associate Professor in 2007 and Head of Biochemistry in September 2008. He has published over 123 research papers, 63 review articles, and 12 book chapters. His published work has received over 10,000 citations, including 1 manuscript with >800 citations, 1 manuscript >400 citations, 2 manuscripts with >300 citations, 4 manuscripts with >200 citations (Web of Science, August 2021). He has previously collaborated with colleagues in the food industry via Food for Health Ireland (FHI) and in the pharmaceutical industry via AstraZeneca (Manchester, UK).
He was recently a member of the Australian Research Council (ARC) College of Experts (2012 – 2015) where he served on the Biological Sciences and Biotechnology Panel. With respect to nutrition research, Prof. Newsholme collaborates with colleagues in Food Science and Chemical and Petroleum Engineering at Curtin University with respect to the generation of glucose-lowering bioactive peptides derived from Western Australian lupin seeds. This project has recently received funding from the Australian Research Council, via a Linkage Grant with industry, starting in 2021. Prof. Newsholme was on the editorial board of ‘European Journal of Clinical Nutrition’ and ‘Clinical Science’ and currently is on the editorial board of ‘Antioxidants’ and is Editor-in-Chief of ‘Immunometabolism’. He has recently contributed to the development of teaching content of the new Curtin medical curriculum, Years 2 and 3, covering fundamental biochemical concepts.
Dr. Virginia Delos Reyes is the Head of the Section of Sleep Medicine at the Department of Pulmonary, Critical Care and Sleep Medicine at the Lung Center of the Philippines and is the Program Director of its Sleep Medicine Fellowship Program. Dr. delos Reyes is also an Associate Professor at the Ateneo School of Medicine and Public Health. She was a past President of the ASEAN Sleep Federation, the Philippine Society of Sleep Medicine and also headed the Philippine College of Chest Physicians Sleep Medicine Council. Dr. Delos Reyes obtained her Doctor of Medicine at the University of the Philippines College of Medicine. She then completed her residency in Internal Medicine and Pulmonary Fellowship at the Philippine General Hospital. Dr. delos Reyes has a Masters in Health Profession at the University of the Philippines. She further took her Sleep Medicine Fellowship at the Stanford University and Hospital.
Her research interests include obstructive sleep apnea, obesity hypoventilation syndrome, overlap syndrome, insomnia, and asthma. She had been involved in several research trials in COVID-19.
Assoc. Prof. Mythily Subramaniam is Assistant Chairman Medical Board (Research) and Lead Investigator of the Programme of Mental Health Policy Studies at the Institute of Mental Health (IMH) in Singapore. She has a teaching appointment at the Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health, National University Singapore. She is also a consultant with the Ministry of Health, Singapore.
She has worked in the field of mental health for more than 15 years and her main academic and research interests include psychiatric epidemiology, psychosis and addictions. She has led three nation-wide studies – the first and second Singapore Mental Health Study, surveys that established the prevalence of select mental disorders in the adult population of Singapore; and the Well-being of the Singapore Elderly study, a survey among older adults that aims to establish the prevalence, risk factors and cost associated with dementia in Singapore. She has over 400 publications in peer-reviewed journals and is a reviewer with many international journals and is on the editorial board of several peer-reviewed journals in the field of mental health. She graduated from the Lady Hardinge Medical College in India and received her Ph.D. in Gambling Studies from Monash University.
Mr. Bryan Quek is Director of Community Outreach at the Health Promotion Board in Singapore. He oversees health promotion programme implementation in the community. Through customised and integrated programmes, he drives the effort to educate and promote healthy living amongst those living in the community. Working with community and social partners, he and his team have reached out to Singaporeans island wide through active engagement on different platforms.
Dr. Loke Wai Chiong is the Head (Integrated Health Promotion) and Clinical Director (Programmes) at MOH Office for Healthcare Transformation in Singapore. He leads the Integrated Health Promotion (InHealth) programme which aims to implement a comprehensive set of integrated, coordinated initiatives concurrently in test precincts, to co-create with the community an environment and community norm which would make health-promoting behaviours the default. He also helps to develop initiatives for mental wellness and financing schemes to support new models of care.
Prior to joining MOHT, Dr. Loke was Partner and Healthcare Sector leader for Deloitte Southeast Asia. As a management consultant in private sector, he advised governments, investors, life sciences companies, providers and payers globally. His projects included business strategy advisory to biomedical and health-tech start-ups, new product development, regulatory and market entry, commercial feasibility of healthcare investments, mergers & acquisitions, amongst others.
He started his career as a practising Family Physician, and went on to hospital management and health policy leadership roles across public and private sectors. Dr. Loke completed his medical training at the National University of Singapore. He holds a Masters in Family Medicine (NUS), Fellowships with the Academy of Medicine Singapore and the College of Family Physicians, and Double MBA from the University of California (Los Angeles) and the National University of Singapore.
Mr. John Hellmann is the Vice President, Government Affairs for Herbalife Nutrition in Asia Pacific, based in Singapore. In this role, Mr. Hellmann is responsible for setting the strategic direction of the Government Affairs function in Asia Pacific. He acts as an ambassador and key advocate for the Company in markets around the region, helps shape the public narrative and tell the ‘Herbalife Nutrition story’ while enhancing the company reputation and brand. He also has the overall responsibility of managing and enhancing relationships with governments at federal and local levels, and setting priorities for government messaging by partnering closely with the country management within the Asia Pacific region.
Prior to joining Herbalife Nutrition, he had been part of the leadership of BowerGroupAsia (BGA), a leading government affairs consultancy, where he served as Vice President & Managing Director of BGA’s Thailand Office, based in Bangkok. Prior to that posting, he served with BGA in a variety of roles in Los Angeles, Singapore, and Washington DC. Mr. Hellmann has nearly 15 years of experience in government relations within the Indo-Pacific region.
Mr. Hellmann has a M.Sc. in Public Policy from the University of California, Los Angeles, and a Bachelor of Arts in English Literature and Philosophy from the University of Rhode Island. He is an avid guitarist and diver.
Dr. Sidharth Kachroo is the Medical Director & Head, Medical Portfolio Management at Prudential Assurance Company in Singapore. He leads Prudential Singapore’s medical portfolio and is responsible for providing solutions to achieve profitable and sustainable metrics for Prudential’s Health Insurance business. His role includes development and implementation of management initiatives related to medical business as well as supporting cross functional teams in developing long-term healthcare models, both on a digital and conventional platform.
Dr. Sidharth has an extensive reinsurance experience and was responsible for providing expertise and delivering solutions related to health product development, health underwriting & claims as well as health-tech solutions to insurers in South & South East Asia. He has significant operational expertise in managing health KPO’s and TPA’s. He is a regular speaker at insurance forums and counts over eighteen years of experience in the health insurance industry.
Dr. Sidharth holds a Doctor of Medicine degree and was actively involved in clinical practice prior to joining the Insurance industry.
Organizers
Sponsors
Contact
If you have any enquiries on this event, please contact ILSI SEA Region Secretariat at event@ilsisea.org.sg