Leading Patients Beyond 100: Dr. Naidoo’s Approach Behind Exceptional GlycanAge Results

Dr. Lesantha Naidoo is the founder of the 100 Club Concierge at Avyanna Wellness Institute, where she blends precision medicine with genuine human connection. She believes community is a form of care, and it shows - her patients consistently achieve higher-than-average GlycanAge improvements because she treats health as partnership, not protocol. If we were giving grades, she’d be the quiet A+ in our practitioner network: leading with both heart and mastery, and truly living the model she teaches.
 
Dr. Naidoo, you’ve built an impressive track record across multiple fields of medicine and wellness. What drew you specifically to concierge care, and how did your path lead you here? 

My journey really started in childhood. I struggled with my weight from a very young age - I was about two years old when I saw a Kit Kat commercial on TV, threw a tantrum for it, and my grandfather drove around the entire city to find it because it was new at the time. I loved it, and that was really the beginning of my weight struggle through childhood and into adulthood.

A few years later, I remember my parents waking us up in the middle of the night and driving to my grandparents’ house. My grandfather had taken his life. I still remember the huge flames, my grandmother crying, and my mother standing beside her, completely solid. I didn’t understand what death meant, but I remember asking, “Where’s my grandfather?” And right around that time, Michael Jackson had released “Heal the World.” And that just stuck in my mind, and I knew that that's the person that I wanted to be in this world. And it really became the anthem of my life and what I live by. So from that age, I knew I was going to be a doctor. 

I went to medical school, but as I went through it I realized that just being a doctor is not the solution, because our medical system is so reactive. I was a doctor and I was still fat, sick, and honestly unhappy. That’s what led me to integrative and holistic medicine, obesity medicine, functional medicine, and mindset work - because reactive medicine wasn’t helping me, and it wasn't healing the people I wanted to serve. Concierge care lets me finally practice the way I always believed medicine should be practiced - proactive, personal, and truly healing.

That’s such a powerful and inspiring journey. And while concierge care clearly allows you to practice medicine in the way you believe truly heals people, I imagine it also comes with its own challenges.

What would you say is the biggest one you face in this type of practice, and how do you personally approach it?

The biggest challenge, I believe, is buy-in. People come to me and say, “Dr. Naidoo, I want to get off my prescriptions. I want to optimize my health.” And they genuinely mean it - but we live in a world where everyone wants a quick, easy solution. And there is no such thing as a quick fix. Even pharmaceuticals feel quick at first, but there are always downstream effects. The first shift has to be mindset.
What makes me successful in situations like this is the way I modify a patient’s plan. I don’t just ask, “What are your goals?” - I also dive into their beliefs, what a joyful life looks like for them, and what is non-negotiable. I don’t believe in “non-compliance.” If you’re not following the plan, it means I haven’t created one you have buy-in into - one that fits your life, your capacity, and what you’re genuinely willing to show up for.

So when I check in and nothing has been done, I don’t blame the person - I modify the plan. But I’m also very honest. If someone tells me, “I want to get off medication,” but also, “I want to travel and eat and drink whatever I want,” then I tell them plainly: those two goals conflict - we have to choose what is most important and build from there.

And what I’ve seen is that once people start, even slowly, it snowballs. Over time they reduce the toxic stuff, add the healthful stuff, and they feel empowered. Because the plan matches their life and they keep going - not out of discipline, but out of alignment.

And the other piece people overlook is community, connection, relationships, and purpose. Those are also medicine - for the brain, cognitive function, emotional well-being, and ultimately, longevity. It’s not just about living to 100; it’s about living to 100 with 100% of your joy, purpose, and potential - that’s sometimes a challenge to instill into people but I’m doing my best to do so.

And that alignment piece you mentioned - living to 100% of your joy, purpose, and potential - ties beautifully into something unique about your model. 

You’ve created the “100 Club Concierge”- can you tell us more about the concept behind the Club - why you started it, what the “100” signifies, and how it shapes the way you care for patients?

So yes, concierge care can look very different depending on who’s delivering it - for me that’s the “100 Club.” The idea is that I will never care for more than 100 patients at a time, and that we are working toward living to 100% of our potential, ideally to 100 years and beyond.

What I integrate is both the latest healthcare technology and the age-old principles that our grandparents and great-grandparents lived by - things we know build real health. Blue Zone principles are a big part of it too. So the 100 Club is not just a medical practice, it’s a wellness community where we share the values of optimizing our potential, living healthy lives, supporting one another, and growing together.

We do things together - community service, social activities, movement, purposeful eating, connection - because all of that is medicine. I don’t believe health is separate from life. Health is your life. Everything you consume, everyone you interact with, how you use your time, it’s all part of your well-being.

And I meet my patients where they are. Sometimes that literally means going for a walk on a trail instead of an office visit. I had a patient recently who was struggling with work anxiety and thought he needed medication. We walked for 20 minutes, and by the end he said, “I think I’m good.” Not because I treated him, but because we removed the walls - the agenda, the desk, the clock - and replaced it with fresh air, movement, connection, and presence.

I’m really impressed by how personal and collaborative your approach is - you design plans around people’s real lives, not an idealised version of them. That philosophy is very aligned with how we think about prevention at GlycanAge.

I know you started using the test from the moment you opened your clinic - what drew you to it originally, and how does it support your clients’ health journey today?

So my focus is total health optimization - and for me that has to be data-driven. I have a breadth of knowledge around tools that can help, but every human body is different. What works for me may not work for you, and I want the plan to be as tailored as possible.

I actually did the GlycanAge test on myself first, and it was a game changer in my own health. I’m a type 2 diabetic, and even after doing “all the right things,” some markers just weren’t moving the way they should. GlycanAge helped me see the deeper layer - not just A1C, not just a cholesterol panel - but what was happening at the cellular and immune system level. It gave me clarity on what I really needed to work on.

And I’ve seen the same thing with patients. One example: I have a patient whose glycan profile came back even better than we expected, and that allowed me to fine-tune his plan down to the smallest adjustments. It helped us understand that his primary issue is metabolic dysfunction and it also helped me see that even though his numbers looked “fine,” there was still a longevity benefit in microdosing his hormones - not because of the labs on paper, but because of how his body responds in function.

The test changed the conversation. Instead of debating, “Why am I on this prescription? Can I get off of it?” I could say, “Here’s what your cells are telling us. Here’s your trajectory if we stop, and here’s what it supports if we continue.” And from there, it becomes an informed choice - his choice. That’s the power of this level of data. It lets me support the function of the body, not just the metrics on a lab slip, so patients can live longer, but also live better.

It’s great to hear how the test supports those deeper layers of optimization too. And it really shows in your patients’ results.

Your clients consistently achieve higher-than-average improvements with GlycanAge. What do you think drives that? What does it take to create those outcomes?

I think there are two perspectives that have to be considered. From the provider side, it’s a partnership. A lot of providers push an agenda or a treatment plan that we know optimizes function, but if it’s not aligned with the patient, it won’t work. So the collaboration itself is a big part of why my patients do well. 
The second piece is synthesizing data. Most providers who use GlycanAge also do functional testing, but the mistake is interpreting everything separately. I always combine the data - I look at all the tests together to understand the full picture, not just one isolated result.

From the patient perspective, which I believe is actually the most important, they have to understand that their health is their biggest asset. They have to have to be motivated, and they have to understand why they’re doing this test and what they’re going to do with the insights. GlycanAge isn’t a “something is wrong, so test me” tool - it’s a deeper, more preventative layer. That requires education and ongoing communication, not a once-and-done approach.

And I revisit the plan with them. We re-test, we reassess, we refine. I’m always trying to empower the individual so that eventually they don’t need me for the basics and they only need me to tweak and fine-tune. When someone knows how their body works and how to maintain it, that’s when the results compound - and that’s the goal.

I love that philosophy of “I want you not to need me,” and I can really see how much you emphasise relationship, trust, and community in your work - not just protocols. 
How important is community in the health journey, and what role do you see yourself playing in creating that support system for your patients?

You know, as I said earlier, “Heal the World” really became the anthem of my life - and I truly live and practice from that place. I don’t feel like I “do medicine,” I feel like this is who I am. You can’t separate the physician from the person - it’s all one. And because of that, relationships and community are not extras in my work, they are the foundation.

I include my family in my practice and my patients in my life because I believe healing is relational. We’ve held patient community events themed around love, gratitude, and purpose - and those spaces change the dynamic completely. People see that it’s not a performance, it’s who I am. My children see it too, and even they understand how meaningful these connections are.

That level of authentic community shifts patients mentally and emotionally, which then shifts their health trajectory. Someone once told me after listening to me speak, “My anxiety isn’t clinical - I’m struggling with purpose.” Healing starts there, not with another pill.

And a big part of empowerment for me is giving people all the options up front - every tool, every path. It opens a real conversation: “Here is everything you could do, but what actually resonates with you, what is doable, what aligns with how you want to live?”

I have to say, I’ve genuinely never heard of a practitioner celebrating things like wedding anniversaries with patients - that level of connection is rare and honestly really beautiful to witness.
As a final takeaway, if you could leave people with one piece of advice on taking ownership of their health, what would it be?

I guess the last thing I want to say is to remember that every human being has the potential to improve their health. It doesn't matter where they come from or what socioeconomic status they're in, because the basic foundation of health comes from the natural elements. One of the easiest examples is temperature variability - you don’t have to go to a med spa or a gym that has a cold plunge. Just go into a lake. We all have public access to a lake. Or keep the shower on cold.

Grounding is another one. There is so much benefit in just walking on the ground, or getting sunlight, or breathing fresh air. Just breathing. Take 10 minutes to intentionally breathe every day. You don’t need any equipment for these things, and yet they have such a profound effect on the nervous system, the cardiovascular system, our neurotransmitters, all of it.

So I like to say: you don’t have to be wealthy to be healthy - and we really need to shift our mindset to understand that true health is the real wealth.

If you’d like to learn more about how Dr. Naidoo is redefining longevity at the Avyanna Wellness Institute, visit https://lesantha.com/100-club-concierge.