Desert Island Discs

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Castaway guests share the soundtrack of their lives.

Eight tracks, a book and a luxury: what would you take to a desert island? Guests share the soundtrack of their lives.

BBC Radio 4 LW

Desert Island Discs: Dr Waheed Arian, doctor

02/10/2022

Dr Waheed Arian, doctor

BBC Radio 4 - Desert Island Discs, Dr Waheed Arian, doctor

Dr Waheed Arian, radiologist, shares the soundtrack of his life with Lauren Laverne.

Dr Waheed Arian, radiologist and charity founder, shares the eight tracks, book and luxury item he would take with him if cast away to a desert island. With Lauren Laverne.

Dr Waheed Arian is a radiologist who set up a charity called Arian Teleheal in 2015.  The charity enables volunteer doctors in the west to advise colleagues in conflict zones using smartphone technology. The charity has helped save many lives in countries including Syria, Uganda and Afghanistan where Waheed was born.

In 1988, at the height of the Soviet-Afghan conflict, Waheed and his family fled Kabul for Pakistan where they lived in a refugee camp for the next few years.  Waheed was just five when they arrived there and contracted tuberculosis. The doctor who saved his life planted a dream and Waheed decided that one day he would study medicine.

When he was 15 Afghanistan was in the grip of the Taliban and Waheed and his parents knew it was only a matter of time before he would be recruited to join their fight.  Waheed's family found someone who, for a fee, offered to help him leave the country and claim refugee status in the UK.  He arrived in the UK in 1999, studied A levels while working in a number of jobs and then in 2003 took up a place to read medicine at Cambridge University.

In 2014 he began training as a radiologist and currently works in the A&E department at a busy NHS hospital.  In 2017 he won a UN Global Hero Award for his charity work. 

DISC ONE:  Lose Yourself by Eminem  
DISC TWO: Gule Sori by Farhad Darya  
DISC THREE: Eye of the Tiger by Survivor   
DISC FOUR: Never Enough by Loren Allred   
DISC FIVE: Home by Michael Bublé  
DISC SIX: Fly by Celine Dion 
DISC SEVEN: Are You Ready for Love by Elton John 
DISC EIGHT: Everything I Wanted by Billie Eilish   

BOOK CHOICE: The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind by Bryan Mealer and William Kamkwamba
LUXURY ITEM: Pen and paper    
CASTAWAY'S FAVOURITE: Fly by Celine Dion 

Presenter: Lauren Laverne
Producer: Paula McGinley

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Dr Waheed Arian, doctor

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