Dr. Lawrence A. Leiter is director of the Lipid Clinic, Associate Director of the Clinical Nutrition and Risk Factor Modification Centre, and an associate scientist at the Li Ka Shing Knowledge Institute at St. Michael’s Hospital, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, where he was also the Head of the Division of Endocrinology and Metabolism from 2000 to 2010. He is a Professor in the Departments of Medicine and Nutritional Sciences at the University of Toronto.
Dr. Leiter has several research interests, including clinical trials on the prevention of atherosclerosis, especially in diabetes, and the dietary and pharmacological treatment of diabetes, hyperlipidaemia, hypertension and obesity. He has over 590 publications in peer-reviewed journals. He was an investigator in many of the landmark diabetes trials including the DCCT, ACCORD and ADVANCE and is on the executive/steering committees of many ongoing outcomes trials in both diabetes and lipids.
Dr. Leiter is a Past-President of the Canadian Society of Endocrinology & Metabolism and a past Chair of the Clinical and Scientific Section of the Canadian Diabetes Association (CDA). He has been involved in many national and international committees and consensus conferences, including those of the International Diabetes Federation, CDA, Canadian Hypertension Education Program (CHEP), Canadian Cardiovascular Society (Dyslipidaemia) and Obesity Canada.
For his work, he has received a number of awards, including the CDA Frederick G. Banting Award and the American Diabetes Association Charles H. Best Award (awarded to DCCT investigators), both for Distinguished Service, the 2005 CSEM Educator of the Year Award and the 2006 CDA Gerald S. Wong Award in recognition of significant contributions to the diabetes community. He was the inaugural winner of the St. Michael’s Hospital Complete Physician Award in 2009. He is also the 2016 recipient of both the CDA Lifetime Achievement Award for Research Excellence and the CSEM Robert Volpe Distinguished Service Award.