Leeds Health Tech Founder Launches Obesity Care App

Tsitsi Chinyandura has launched Lotessa, an ORCHA-assured platform helping people on Wegovy and Mounjaro manage the realities of treatment after the prescription

A Leeds health tech founder has launched an app to tackle a fast-growing gap in weight-loss care: what happens after the prescription. Tsitsi Chinyandura has released Lotessa, a digital aftercare and self-management platform for adults using injectable and oral obesity medication, now live on the Apple App Store and Google Play. Based at Nexus at the University of Leeds, the app has secured ORCHA Assured Bronze status, an independent digital-health standard. It arrives as medicines such as Wegovy and Mounjaro reshape weight management across the UK and as questions grow about how patients are supported once treatment begins.

Why This Matters For Leeds

Leeds has become one of the UK’s strongest health-tech centres and Lotessa adds a patient-founded business to that cluster at exactly the moment obesity care is scaling nationally. It’s a good example of the city’s ecosystem working: a founder building from lived experience, based at Nexus and plugged into Leeds Teaching Hospitals’ innovation programme. It puts the city at the centre of a genuinely national health question, rather than on the sidelines of it.

A Leeds Health Tech Founder Tackling the Aftercare Gap

Chinyandura created Lotessa after her own experience of using obesity medication exposed the difference between getting a prescription and feeling supported through the realities of taking it. Those realities include managing dose changes, side effects, appetite shifts, nutrition, plateaus and knowing when a symptom needs escalating to a professional. The support can be patchy, especially privately. Researchers at University College London estimate that around 95% of people using weight-loss medication access it through private providers where structured nutritional support is not always included. Lotessa is designed to help bridge that gap rather than replace clinical care. Through the app, users can track injectable and oral medication, log side effects, set reminders, record non-scale progress, complete a 3D body scan, read evidence-informed content and join a moderated community. It runs on a freemium model, so core support is free to use.

“Obesity medication can be life-changing, but patients do not stop needing support when the prescription is issued. That is often when the questions begin.”

— Tsitsi Chinyandura, Founder, Lotessa

A National Problem, Built From Leeds

The scale of the opportunity is considerable. NHS England’s latest Health Survey for England found 30% of adults were living with obesity in 2024, and the Government has estimated obesity costs UK society up to £107bn a year, including more than £9bn to the NHS. A UCL-led study estimated 1.6 million adults in Britain used medicines like Wegovy and Mounjaro for weight loss in the year to early 2025, with a further 3.3 million interested in doing so. The aftercare gap Lotessa targets is increasingly recognised: a recent clinical review described the ‘clinical support gap’ in telehealth-based GLP-1 care as a real and growing issue. Lotessa is a member of the Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust Innovation Pop Up, which connects health-tech firms with clinicians. The Leeds health tech founder is now exploring partnerships with pharmacies and providers to make digital aftercare a routine part of treatment.