Dr David Lovell-Smith

Telehealth Available Nationwide

Services
Reversal of type 2 diabetes.
Losing weight
Alleviating inflammatory conditions.
Taming the Metabolic Syndrome

Reversal of type 2 diabetes.
I work with patients aged 30 to 70 who are motivated to make changes to diet & lifestyle and open to new ideas.
Ideal patient: the 52-year-old male engineer who in 6 months managed to lower his HbA1c from 90 to 38 mmol/mol without using drugs.
See my website at www.digestionready.com/relearning-hunger for RCTs on insulin sensitivity & weight, and a description of my method.

Losing weight: Patients from 30 to 70 years similarly motivated to make changes to diet and lifestyle and open to new ideas. Ideal patient: the 62-year-old woman who in 6 months has lost 33 kg without resorting to eating restraint and with minimal changes to diet (but attention to timing of food, see methods below).

Inflammatory conditions including gastritis, early rheumatoid, IBD and Graves Disease. Ideal patient: The 16-year-old boy who presented de novo with Crohns and was advised by his specialist he would need bowel resection. He followed the protocol conscientiously and is now in his 19th year of remission without the use of drugs or surgery.

Methods
Rather than rely on willpower or dietary restraint, I train my patients to attend to interoceptive sensations (hunger and satiety) and to eat according to these internal cues. Timing of food intake and the conditions under which it is eaten are thus paramount. Attention to these ensures the body is in optimum condition to digest and metabolise the food, hence the name of the programme - the DigestionReadyTM programme. Although the main principle is simple (eat when youre ready to digest the food) there are many nuances, and it takes time for new habits to settle in. Over the last 30 years I have found a 3-month guided programme is the best way to bring results for my patients.
In the diabetes-intensive version of the programme I also use a conventional low carbohydrate diet, and I take full advantage of the continuous blood glucose monitor.

Comparison to intermittent fasting
Since many overweight and diabetes patients do not experience physical hunger, they are typically encouraged to wait until hunger appears. In effect this is fasting, but in a more natural and less arbitrary way than with intermittent fasting. The DigestionReady programme is led by the natural promptings of the body rather than the imperious promptings of the clock!

Qualifications/Memberships
BA, PhD, MB,ChB, MGP(Distn.) Dip.Gen.Pr.(Distn.), FRNZCGP

Publications and presentations
M. Ciampolini, D. Lovell-Smith, et al. Sustained Self-Regulation of Energy Intake: Initial Hunger Improves Insulin Sensitivity Journal of Nutrition and Metabolism 2010 Vol. 2010 DOI: 10.1155/2010/286952
http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2010/286952

M. Ciampolini, H. D. Lovell-Smith and M. Sifone Sustained self-regulation of energy intake. Loss of weight in overweight subjects. Maintenance of weight in normal-weight subjects. Nutrition & Metabolism 2010 Vol. 7 Issue 4 DOI: 10.1186/1743-7075-7-4.
http://www.nutritionandmetabolism.com/content/7/1/4

M. Ciampolini, H. D. Lovell-Smith, T. Kenealy and R. Bianchi Hunger can be taught: Hunger Recognition regulates eating and improves energy balance International Journal of General Medicine 2013 Vol. 2013 Issue 6 Pages 465-478 DOI: DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.2147/IJGM.S40655

H. D. Lovell-Smith Diabetes: Let the body speak its mind New Zealand Family Family Physician 1996 Vol. 3 Pages 37-39

H. D. Lovell-Smith, T. Kenealy and S. Buetow
Eating when empty is good for your health
Medical Hypotheses 2010 Vol. 75 Pages 172-178

H. D. Lovell-Smith Why eating when empty is good for your health In: Second International Ayurveda Congress, Congress Proceedings International Maharishi AyurVeda Foundation ISBN 978-90-828379-0-2 2017

Presentations also to the Annual Symposium of the Society for the Study of Ingestive behaviour (SSIB) in 2008 (Paris) and 2019 (Utrecht).