Dr Manju Chandran, a leader in the fields of Endocrinology and Bone Metabolism, is the Inaugural Chair of the Asia Pacific Consortium on Osteoporosis (APCO).

Dr Chandran currently serves as a Senior Consultant Endocrinologist and Director of the Osteoporosis and Bone Metabolism Unit that she set up at Singapore General Hospital in 2007.

After completing her fellowship in Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine, Dr Chandran, who is an American citizen, moved to Singapore in 2003, where she has been practicing ever since. Dr Chandran is Chairperson of the Singapore Ministry of Health’s Appropriate Care Guidelines for Osteoporosis Working Group, and, was recently elected to the Board of the International Osteoporosis Foundation (IOF).

She is immediate past Chairperson of the Chapter of Endocrinologists of the College of Physicians Singapore, elected member of the Council of Scientific Advisors of the IOF, a past President of the Endocrine and Metabolic Society of Singapore and an elected member of the Publications Committee of the American Society of Bone and Mineral Research – importantly, the first woman from Asia to hold such a position.

Dr Chandran also serves as Secretary of the Osteoporosis Society of Singapore, Deputy Chair of the Asia Pacific (AP) Panel of the Regional Advisory Council of the IOF, and the Vice Chairperson of the AP Panel of the International Society of Clinical Densitometry.

She has won a multitude of international awards, including the IOF-ESCEO International Young Investigator Award for 2013, the IOF Committee of National Societies Medal in 2015 and her Fracture Liaison Service at Singapore General Hospital, OPTIMAL, was the first in Asia Pacific and the third in the world to clinch the Gold Star in the IOF’s global Capture the Fracture campaign in 2015.

Dr Chandran also won the light-hearted but meaningful, Singhealth-DUKE-National University of Singapore Most Caffeinated Researcher Award 2019 – given to the researcher in the Singhealth group of institutions with the most positive attitude, who never gives up, and who always goes the extra mile while collaborating with others – a commitment and passion which she also brings to her role at APCO.

She was the Organising Co-Chairperson of the 7th IOF Regional Congress on Osteoporosis held in November 2018 in Sydney, and was the Organising Chairperson of the first Singapore Bone Metabolic Disease Symposium and the IOF’s first Asia Pacific Skeletal Rare Disorder Course in Singapore in November 2019.

Dr Chandran’s research and clinical interests include the Epidemiology and Health Economic Burden of Osteoporosis, Rare Bone Disorders, Renal Bone Disease and Parathyroid Disorders. She has more than 125 publications in international peer-reviewed journals to her credit, and is a regular speaker at regional and international conferences in the fields of Endocrinology and Bone Metabolism.

We look forward to the expansive knowledge and expertise she will bring to this important role.