The Department of Health - Abu Dhabi (DoH) and Roche Pharmaceuticals UAE have announced a strategic collaboration to advance early detection and management of diabetic macular edema (DME), a diabetes complication that can damage central vision. The announcement was made at the Abu Dhabi Future Health Summit (ADFHS) 2026, which ran at ADNEC Centre Abu Dhabi from 20 to 22 October 2026.
This is not a product launch press release. It is a regulator and a pharmaceutical company agreeing to generate and use local real-world evidence (RWE) on how people with diabetes in Abu Dhabi move through screening, referral, treatment and follow-up for DME. For Commercial Excellence, Medical Affairs and Market Access teams covering the UAE, that matters as much as a new molecule, because it can reshape who gets screened, how fast they reach ophthalmology, and which accounts feel the demand first.
A note on sources. The collaboration details below come from the DoH-attributed press release carried on Zawya and from related public statements. Broader UAE diabetes figures come from the IDF Diabetes Atlas 11th Edition 2025 global factsheet. Abu Dhabi's IFHAS screening expansion is from the Abu Dhabi Media Office release of 1 August 2025. We did not invent programme budgets, patient volumes or formulary rules that those sources do not state.
How Dawaa News surfaced the story
Dawaa News amplified the DoH-Roche collaboration on its LinkedIn company page (short link cited in our monitor brief: lnkd.in/eS27f25d) and in its MENA news feed. For BioNixus, that feed is a discovery layer. Primary verification still runs through the DoH-attributed press materials and regulator or company sites. We treat Dawaa News as the alert, not as the sole source for numbers.
What was announced
According to the Zawya press release, DoH and Roche will work on generating local real-world evidence to better understand the burden of DME among people living with diabetes in Abu Dhabi. The programme looks at existing screening practices, referral pathways, healthcare resource use and clinical outcomes, so gaps can be found and interventions designed for Abu Dhabi's own system rather than imported wholesale from other countries.
Both parties say they will then explore ways to strengthen screening and early detection, improve diagnosis and referral to specialist ophthalmology, and support evidence-based treatment and follow-up. Capacity building for healthcare professionals and awareness among people with diabetes about regular eye exams are listed as further areas of cooperation.
A joint taskforce will guide phased activities, share knowledge and turn emerging evidence into recommendations aligned with recognised clinical standards and Abu Dhabi's prevention and coordinated-care goals.
Dr Asma AlMannaei, Executive Director of the Health Life Sciences Sector at DoH, is quoted saying that the value of health data lies in what is done with it, and that the collaboration will generate local evidence to inform improvements in screening, referrals and follow-up. Mohamed ElShaarawy, General Manager for the UAE at Roche Pharmaceuticals, is quoted on the need for early detection and timely management, and on using RWE to see where patients face delays.
Why DME, not "diabetes eye disease" in general
DME is a specific complication. It affects the macula, the central part of the retina used for sharp vision. Fluid leakage and swelling there can cut reading vision and day-to-day function. It sits inside the wider family of diabetic eye disease, which also includes diabetic retinopathy in its various stages.
The press materials frame DME as a condition that can cause significant vision loss if it is not detected and managed in time. They stress screening, accurate diagnosis, appropriate treatment and continued follow-up. That sequence is the commercial map as well as the clinical one. A medicine or device only reaches patients who have been found, referred and kept in follow-up. If the pathway leaks, brand share debates become secondary.
Roche's UAE leadership has also pointed, in earlier public comments, to a three-year partnership with the Abu Dhabi Public Health Centre (ADPHC) that includes raising awareness and supporting early detection for non-communicable diseases, with early workstreams that include lung cancer and DME. The new DoH collaboration sits in the same prevention and early-detection agenda, but is explicitly tied to RWE on care pathways for DME.
How this sits next to Abu Dhabi's IFHAS screening programme
On 1 August 2025, the Abu Dhabi Media Office reported that ADPHC had expanded its comprehensive screening programme, IFHAS. Among the updates, vision screening was expanded to include ophthalmologist consultations and advanced retinal imaging that can help detect diabetic retinopathy, glaucoma and age-related macular degeneration. Eligible Thiqa cardholders aged 18 and above were encouraged to book through the Sahatna app or approved providers.
That matters for reading the Roche-DoH news. Abu Dhabi is already investing in broader vision screening infrastructure. A DME-focused RWE programme can sit on top of that base: it can ask whether people with diabetes who enter IFHAS or other channels are actually reaching ophthalmology when imaging suggests risk, how long that takes, and what happens after the first specialist visit.
For market research, the question is not only "is screening available?" It is "where does the pathway break, by account type and by emirate workflow?" National averages hide those breaks.
The UAE diabetes burden the pathway has to serve
The IDF Diabetes Atlas 11th Edition 2025 global factsheet reports, for the United Arab Emirates (2024 estimates underlying the Atlas):
- Adult population (20-79 years): 7,710,700
- Adults with diabetes (20-79): 1,274,200
- Age-standardised diabetes prevalence (20-79): 20.7%
- Proportion of undiagnosed diabetes (20-79): 64.0%
- Diabetes-related expenditure per person with diabetes (20-79): USD 1,583.5
- Diabetes-related deaths (20-79): 830
Those numbers are the backdrop for any diabetic eye programme. Roughly one in five adults, on an age-standardised basis, lives with diabetes. About two in three people with diabetes are estimated to be undiagnosed. Undiagnosed people do not enter retinopathy or DME pathways on schedule. Any commercial forecast that assumes complete diagnosis will overstate near-term treated volumes and understate the value of case-finding and screening uptake.
BioNixus already frames the UAE diabetes story around that undiagnosed burden and around channel differences across DHA, DoH and federal pathways. See our UAE diabetes market research page for the country view, and our UAE healthcare market research overview for how we structure account-level work.
What "real-world evidence" changes for commercial teams
International trials tell you what a medicine can do under protocol conditions. RWE on pathways tells you what the system actually does with patients who have diabetes and eye risk. For a Head of Marketing or Commercial Director in the UAE, the practical differences are:
- Screening capacity becomes a launch constraint. If retinal imaging and ophthalmology slots are scarce in certain networks, uptake of any DME therapy will follow appointment supply, not just HCP preference.
- Referral leakage becomes a share driver. Two hospitals with similar diabetes clinics can produce very different ophthalmology volumes if one has a tight referral protocol and the other does not.
- Follow-up adherence shapes refill and injection cadence. DME care is often longitudinal. Drop-off after the first specialist visit changes utilisation curves.
- Message maps must match local pathway language. Field teams that talk only about efficacy, without speaking to screening and referral friction, will sound disconnected from what DoH and providers are measuring.
None of that requires guessing Roche's internal brand plan. It follows directly from a public RWE agenda that names screening, referrals, resource use and outcomes.
What we do not know yet (and should not pretend to)
The public materials do not, in the sources we checked, publish:
- Patient sample size or timeline for the RWE analyses
- Which electronic health record extracts or registries will be used
- Whether specific Roche medicines are named inside the research protocol
- Budget, number of sites or KPIs for the joint taskforce
- How findings will be published or shared with providers
Treat those as open. When they appear, they will change the research brief. Until then, commercial planning should track the programme as a pathway and policy signal, not as a quantified demand shock.
We also note that third-party access guides discuss named-patient routes for some ophthalmic biologics in the UAE. Those are separate from this DoH collaboration. Do not collapse "RWE partnership" into "product is now on every formulary." Approved, available, priced and reimbursed remain different facts.
Account-level questions a BioNixus brief would ask
If we were scoping primary research for a diabetes or ophthalmology brand team after this announcement, we would start with questions the national average cannot answer:
Primary care and diabetes clinics
- How often do physicians order retinal screening for people with type 2 diabetes, and what stops them (slot availability, patient cost, unclear referral forms, competing priorities in a short visit)?
- Which accounts already have retinal cameras or tele-ophthalmology links, and which still send patients out with a paper referral?
Ophthalmology and retina services
- What is the typical wait from referral to first retina assessment in major Abu Dhabi public and private centres?
- How are DME treatment decisions documented, and which imaging thresholds trigger anti-VEGF discussion in practice?
Payers and pathway owners
- How do Thiqa / IFHAS pathways interact with private insurance for repeat imaging and specialist follow-up?
- Which quality metrics (if any) already track diabetic eye screening completion?
Patients and caregivers
- What share of diagnosed patients recall being told they need regular eye exams?
- Where do they drop off after a first abnormal finding?
Those questions map to BioNixus's usual lens: what the national rate hides, which accounts move first, and what evidence a commercial team needs before reallocating headcount or promotional weight.
Regional read-through beyond Abu Dhabi
Abu Dhabi often sets the tone for structured prevention programmes in the UAE, but Dubai Health Authority and federal Emirates Drug Establishment rules still shape product access and practice elsewhere. A DoH RWE programme can create templates that other emirates adapt, or it can remain Abu Dhabi-specific for years. Commercial teams should model both.
For Gulf headquarters that run UAE and Saudi Arabia from one plan, the contrast is useful. Saudi diabetes volume is larger on IDF figures (see our companion article on TriGutirek XR and Saudi access). Abu Dhabi's move is about pathway intelligence and screening quality. Different problem, same therapy area. Do not copy a KSA retail FDC playbook onto a UAE ophthalmology pathway story.
Practical steps for the next 90 days
- Map your UAE diabetes accounts against ophthalmology referral strength, not only against diabetes script volume.
- Ask medical and access leads how they will engage with any DoH or ADPHC working groups on diabetic eye care, without over-claiming product messages.
- Refresh message testing with ophthalmologists and diabetologists on barriers to screening completion, using Abu Dhabi and Dubai splits.
- Watch for RWE outputs (abstracts, circulars, provider guidance). When local pathway metrics appear, update forecasts.
- Keep undiagnosed diabetes in the model. IDF's 64% undiagnosed estimate for the UAE means screening programmes can create step-changes in detected retinopathy and DME that look like "market growth" but are really case-finding.
Plan UAE diabetic eye and diabetes pathway research with BioNixus
BioNixus is a leading global healthcare market research firm. We run primary research with physicians, pharmacists and accounts across 48 countries, with an AMEA office in Cairo (Sheikh Zayed), a UAE field office in Dubai, Americas office and global HQ in the USA, and a Europe office in the UK. Our physician network is 82,000+ physicians globally and about 3,200 in the Middle East.
If you need evidence on diabetic eye pathways, DME referral leakage or UAE diabetes account behaviour before you reset your 2026-2027 plan, contact our team. A scoped proposal comes back within 48 hours.
This article summarises public announcements and epidemiology sources. It is not medical, legal or regulatory advice. It does not recommend any medicine.
