Professor Boulton is a graduate of Newcastle-upon-Tyne and subsequently trained in Sheffield, and Miami prior to accepting an appointment at Manchester University. He has authored more than 450 peer-reviewed manuscripts and book chapters, mainly on diabetic lower limb and renal complications. Among his many awards, he has received the ADA’s Roger Pecoraro Lectureship, the EASD Camillo Golgi prize and was the first recipient of the international award on diabetic foot research. He was the 2008 winner of the ADA’s Harold Rifkin award for distinguished international service in diabetes. Most recently he received the 2012 Georgetown distinguished achievement award in diabetic limb salvage.
He is a previous editor of Diabetic Medicine and is currently an associate editor of Diabetes Care. He was the founding Chairman of the Diabetic Foot Study Group and was previously Chairman of Postgraduate Education and then Hon. Secretary/ programme chair for the EASD. He is currently President of the EASD.
One to One Questions
1) What is your current position?
I am currently a Professor of Medicine (Diabetes) at the University of Manchester and a Consultant Physician at the Manchester Royal Infirmary, Manchester, UK. I am also a Visiting Professor of Medicine (Diabetes) at the University of Miami, Miami, FL, USA and am also President of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes (EASD).
2) What are your proudest achievements?
My graduation with honours from Medical School! Thereafter, my best move was probably entering the field of diabetes which offers so many challenges to the research clinician. Naturally I was proud to receive the first International Award for Research in the Diabetic Foot in 1995, the Golgi prize and lectureship of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes in 2003, and the Harold Rifkin Award of the American Diabetes Association for distinguished international contributions in the field of diabetes.
3) What inspires you?
The facts that I have learnt from patients with diabetes over the last 35 years. Listening to patients’ comments about complications of diabetes has resulted in many ideas for research projects, many of which have in the long-term helped us better understand the pathways that lead to the complications, and thereby help us in a better way to prevent them.
4) What has been the biggest obstacle in your career?
I fear that the increasing burden of administration in the NHS is having an adverse effect on the willingness and ability to perform clinical research. I never thought, having worked in the United States, that I would see the day when the forms to obtain ethical permission for a simple study are more complex now in the UK than they are in the USA
5) Who has been the biggest influence on your career to date?
As a young junior doctor working at the Royal Hallamshire Hospital in Sheffield in the late 1970s, I was considering a career in Primary Care (general practice). It was Professor John Ward, later my mentor, who persuaded me to go into clinical research in diabetes and I have come to realise that “knowing diabetes is knowing medicine”.
6) What is the best aspect about your current role?
I do believe that the ability to combine leading a large multinational diabetes association such as the EASD with caring for patients whom I have known for many years at the Manchester Royal Infirmary and the Manchester Diabetes Centre is a delightful combination. Moreover, my work in the clinical aspects of diabetic complications particularly pertaining to the lower limb and the kidneys, has enabled me to perform collaborative research with many excellent Centres across the world, and to visit many of these lecturing and doing hands-on clinical teaching in both developed and developing countries.
7) And the worst?
Having worked in the NHS since 1976, I fear that the bureaucracy has increased exponentially in recent years. For example, having to be signed off to be safe to use implements such as a tendon hammer and a tuning fork on an annual basis seems to me a little excessive!!
8) What are your long term goals?
One particular goal is to help the lot of those people with diabetes in India and in this regard I am already involved in planning some projects to help identify the true number of people with diabetes and to see what we can do to help in early diagnosis and management to prevent the devastating late complications.
9) If you were Prime Minister, what one aspect would you change?
I think a tax on sugary drink, high fat fast foods, etc, is a must if we are going to curtail the epidemic of type 2 diabetes, obesity and children’s dental decay. In addition, I would consider bringing in a basic low charge for attendance at GP and hospital outpatient appointments.
10) If you were marooned on a desert island, which historical figure would you like to spend your time with and why?
Dr Paul Brand who was born to parents who were missionaries living in the hills just west of what was then Madras, now Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India. His work in leprosy in south India in the 1950s and 60s has informed the way we manage patients with certain diabetic foot problems because the loss of sensation with leprosy, though of different cause, is similar to the end stage of diabetic peripheral nerve disease. He stated, “Because of where I practice medicine, I never made much money: but as I looked back over a lifetime of surgery, the host of friends who were once my patients bring me more joy than wealth can ever bring”. He was an inspiration to all of us and it was my great honour to give the first Paul Brand Memorial Lecture celebrating his life.
