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The multifunctional protein GAPDH (glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase) is linked to pathogenesis in many intractable brain and nervous system diseases. The team developed GAI-17, a GAPDH aggregation inhibitor. When this inhibitor was administered to model mice with acute strokes, there was a significantly lower level of brain cell death and paralysis compared to untreated mice.

GAI-17 also showed no side effects of concern, such as adverse effects on the heart or cerebrovascular system. Furthermore, experiments using GAI-17 showed improvement in the mice even when administered six hours after a stroke.

“The GAPDH aggregation inhibitor we have developed is expected to be a single drug that can treat many intractable neurological diseases, including Alzheimer’s disease,” stated Professor Nakajima. “Going forward, we will verify the effectiveness of this approach in disease models other than stroke and promote further practical research toward the realization of a healthy and long-lived society.”

The findings were published in iScience.

Innovative virtual eye clinics in shopping centerss could significantly reduce waiting times for routine eye appointments, UCL-led research suggests in a first-of-its-kind study.

The research, published in the journal BMJ Open, evaluates the impact of a community-based ‘pop-up’ eye clinic set up in Brent Cross shopping centre in north London in September 2021, at the height of the pandemic, on reducing the post-COVID-19 appointment backlog.

The researchers looked at data from 69,257 appointments attended by 39,357 patients with stable glaucoma and medical retinal conditions at sites across the Moorfields Eye Hospital network in London between June 2018 and April 2023.

During the pandemic, waits for NHS ophthalmology appointments rose sharply. By March 2023, 628,502 people in England were waiting for appointments, with 27,260 of those patients waiting for a year or more, according to the Association of Optometrists.

The researchers found that patients seen in the hospital network hosting the London virtual clinic bucked the national trend – for each week that passed, the delay they were expected to face fell by more than a week (eight days) for the first five months the clinic was operating.

For example, in November 2021 on average patients with stable chronic conditions across the Moorfields Eye Hospital network were being seen six months later than intended, and by April 2022, following the introduction of the clinic, appointments were happening only two months late.

Previous research has suggested so-called virtual clinics, where technicians perform routine scans during patients’ regular check-up appointments that are examined later on by a clinician, can reduce waits for outpatient appointments. In this innovative clinic, technicians without prior healthcare experience were trained on how to perform the scans, with ongoing support from senior clinicians, saving clinical specialists’ face-to-face time for urgent and complex cases.

But this is the first study to quantify how much delays for NHS outpatient ophthalmology appointments can be reduced by the impact of a COVID 19-era service innovation.

Our findings suggest that community-based, technician-led virtual review clinics could play a significant role in reducing wait times for patients with stable chronic eye conditions.

This is especially relevant given current NHS challenges, including chronic workforce shortages – particularly among eye specialists – and limited hospital estate capacity.

This is the first study to quantify the impact of a COVID 19-era service innovation on outpatient ophthalmology delays and the findings highlight a scalable model that could be adopted more widely to improve access and efficiency across the whole of the NHS.

This is very much in line with the ambitious plans to reform the NHS announced by the Prime Minister and Health Secretary only weeks ago.”

Siyabonga Ndwandwe, Lead Author, UCL Research Department of Primary Care and Population Health

The virtual clinic, led by technicians rather than specialists, was designed to monitor low-risk patients outside traditional NHS estates.

The research showed it led to a significant reduction in weekly average appointment delay days (delays reducing by an average of 8.1 days per week) following its launch.

This slowed to a reduction by 0.3 days per week after the initial backlog had been cleared at around five months after opening. Pre-pandemic appointment delays had been increasing on average by 0.9 days per week. This rate increased sharply to 2.0 days per week due to service delivery interruptions associated with COVID-19 lockdowns. 

The researchers measured attendance delays by counting how many days passed between when a patient actually attended and the date they were supposed to attend, based on the appointment date set during their previous visit.

They excluded some patients from the analysis, such as patients with non-stable conditions which they defined as people who were required to be seen less than six months after their previous attendance. They also excluded those where the appointment could have been an emergency, indicated by it taking place more than four weeks earlier than required.

Joint first author Dr Dun Jack Fu (NIHR Moorfields Biomedical Research Centre) said:

“Our report draws on data from one the world’s largest specialist eye centres – Moorfields Eye Hospital NHS Foundation Trust – providing care at over 25 sites across London.”

“Our findings are highly relevant to the post-COVID era with millions of people facing long waits for routine NHS appointments.

“They are in the spirit of the government’s 2024 Change NHS campaign, which emphasises three key shifts for a future-ready health service: moving care from hospitals into communities, harnessing technology (the virtual review part), and focusing on prevention over treatment (preventing eyesight loss by timely monitoring). 

“We believe that pop-up virtual eye clinics in locations such as shopping centres could be a game-changer.”

The study was part of the Healthcare Exemplar for Recovery from COVID 19 Using Linear Examination Systems (HERCULES) project.

Study limitations

The study has some limitations, including that no external control group was available, limiting comparison to national or regional trends.

Also, the study focused on glaucoma and medical retina patients but in 2022 the new clinic expanded the scope of its activities to include cataract patients and newly referred patients, so this analysis might underestimate the overall contribution to reducing ophthalmic appointment delays across the network.

Personalized exercise guidance is needed for people living with Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia (CLL), the most common type of blood cancer, according to a new study led by the University of Surrey. 

 The research, published on eJHaem, surveyed 128 CLL patients across the UK, and found that while nearly 80% expressed a desire to participate in exercise programs, 70% reported never receiving any related advice from their healthcare providers. 

This research highlights the importance exercise plays in improving the lives of people living with Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia. Patients are simply not receiving the guidance they need to engage safely and effectively in exercise and physical activity, which we have found can significantly improve the quality of life of those with CLL.” 

Dr. David Bartlett, Senior Lecturer of Exercise Immunology, University of Surrey

The study highlights the positive impact of physical activity on the quality of life and symptom-management for CLL patients: Those who are physically active report a better quality of life, improved physical and daily functioning, and lower levels of fatigue, pain and severity of their symptoms, compared with those who were physically less active. 

The study points to a lack of structured prehabilitation (the healthcare interventions that aim to prevent complications and side effects ahead of surgery) and rehabilitation programs (the interventions that aim to help recover from injuries, illnesses and medical treatments), for CLL patients within national healthcare systems, including the NHS. 

The research also found that most preferred virtual classes at home or in community clinics, over hospital-based or public group settings, indicating the importance of cost, flexibility and proximity to home. Patients also valued guidance from cancer care specialists, such as exercise physiologists and physiotherapists, over peer-led or general fitness instruction. 

PhD student Ellie Miles adds: 

“It’s not a one-size-fits-all solution, as the treatment status and symptomology are factors to consider when developing CLL-specific exercise programs. Patients want and need expert, tailored advice that addresses their unique challenges and preferences.” 

Yoga, Tai Chi, walking and jogging may be the best forms of exercise to improve sleep quality and ease insomnia, suggest the findings of a comparative pooled data analysis published in the online journal BMJ Evidence Based Medicine.

The findings back the use of exercise as a primary treatment strategy for poor sleep patterns, say the researchers.

Characterized by difficulties falling and staying asleep, and early morning awakening, the prevalence of insomnia ranges from 4-22%, note the researchers. It is associated with heightened risks of various mental and physical health conditions, including dementia and cardiovascular disease.

Drug treatments for insomnia are not without their side effects, and cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), while effective, isn’t always available due to the shortage of trained therapists, explain the researchers.

An emerging body of research suggests that exercise is helpful, but current guidelines don’t specify which types of exercise might be most beneficial. The researchers therefore set out to plug this knowledge gap, with a view to informing clinical practice and helping patients choose the most appropriate exercise for managing their insomnia.

They scoured research databases looking for relevant randomised clinical trials published up to April 2025 and included 22 in a network meta analysis-a statistical technique used to simultaneously compare multiple interventions.

The trials involved 1348 participants and 13 different treatment approaches to ease insomnia, seven of which were exercise based: yoga; Tai Chi; walking or jogging; aerobic plus strength exercise; strength training alone; aerobic exercise combined with therapy; and mixed aerobic exercises. These programmes ranged from 4 up to 26 weeks in length.

The other approaches included CBT; sleep hygiene; Ayurveda; acupuncture/massage; nothing; and existing treatment, such as usual care and/or lifestyle changes, the durations of which ranged from 6 to 26 weeks. 

Validated scoring systems for sleep quality and insomnia severity -PSQI and the ISI45-as well as subjective and objective measures of total sleep time, sleep efficiency (percentage of time spent asleep while in bed), number of awakenings after going to sleep, and time taken to fall asleep (sleep latency) were used to assess sleep patterns.

Compared with existing treatment, CBT is likely to result in a large increase in total sleep time based on subjective sleep diary data. It may also improve sleep efficiency, and shorten the amount of time spent awake after falling asleep as well as sleep latency, with sustained improvements, the findings suggest.

But some of the exercise-based interventions also seemed to be effective, when compared with existing treatment. 

Yoga likely results in a large increase in total sleep time of nearly 2 hours and may improve sleep efficiency by nearly 15%. It may also reduce the amount of time spent awake after falling asleep by nearly an hour, and shorten sleep latency by around half an hour. 

Walking or jogging may result in a large reduction in insomnia severity of nearly 10 points, while Tai Chi may reduce poor sleep quality scores by more than 4 points, increase total sleep time by more than 50 minutes, and reduce time spent awake after falling asleep by over half an hour. It may also shorten sleep latency by around 25 minutes.

Further in-depth analyses revealed that Tai Chi performed significantly better on all subjectively and objectively assessed outcomes than existing treatments for up to 2 years. 

There are potentially plausible biological explanations for the findings, say the researchers.

With its focus on body awareness, controlled breathing, and attentional training, yoga may alter brain activity, thereby alleviating anxiety and depressive symptoms which often interfere with a good night’s sleep, they suggest.

Tai Chi emphasises breath control and physical relaxation and has been shown to decrease sympathetic nervous system activity, dampening down hyperarousal, they add. And its combination of meditative movement and mindfulness may promote emotional regulation, deactivate ‘mental chatter’, and reduce anxiety. It may also help to curb the production of inflammatory chemicals over longer periods, they suggest.

Walking or jogging may improve sleep by increasing energy expenditure, curbing cortisol production, improving emotional regulation, boosting secretion of the sleep hormone melatonin, and enhancing the amount of deep sleep, they continue. 

The researchers acknowledge that 15 (68%) of the included trials contained design and methodological flaws. And there were no standardised, quantifiable metrics for the frequency or intensity of exercise interventions, while the sample sizes of some of the studies were small.

Nevertheless, they conclude: “The findings of this study further underscore the therapeutic potential of exercise interventions in the treatment of insomnia, suggesting that their role may extend beyond adjunctive support to serve as viable primary treatment options. 

“Although current clinical guidelines make only limited mention of exercise, this study provides relatively comprehensive comparative evidence that may inform the development of more specific and actionable clinical recommendations. 

“Given the advantages of exercise modalities such as yoga, Tai Chi, and walking or jogging-including low cost, minimal side effects, and high accessibility-these interventions are well-suited for integration into primary care and community health programmes.”

And there may well be one type of exercise that is best suited to easing a particular symptom of insomnia, they suggest, which further research may clarify.