European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC)
http://www.eortc.be
Created in 1962, the European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC) is a not-for-profit international cancer research organisation. The EORTC has the mission to develop, conduct, coordinate and stimulate translational and clinical research in Europe to improve the management of cancer and related problems by increasing survival but also patients' quality of life. The ultimate goal of the EORTC is to improve the standard of cancer treatment in Europe, through the evaluation of new drugs and other innovative approaches, and to test more effective therapeutic strategies, using drugs which are already commercially available, or surgery or radiotherapy.
The EORTC promotes multidisciplinary cancer research in Europe and is linked to other leading biomedical research organisations around the world. EORTC research takes place in over 300 hospitals, universities and cancer centres in 32 countries, and the unique network of investigators of the EORTC comprises more than 2000 clinicians collaborating on a voluntary basis in 19 multidisciplinary groups.
Professor Martine J. Piccart-Gebhart
Martine J. Piccart-Gebhart, MD, PhD, is the current president of EORTC and Professor of Oncology at the Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB) and Director of the Medicine Department at the Institut Jules Bordet, Belgium. Dr. Piccart-Gebhart founded the Breast International Group (BIG) and currently serves as chair. BIG was created to facilitate breast cancer clinical trials and to reduce the unnecessary duplication of efforts. BIG coordinates 35 clinical research groups based primarily in Europe, South America, and Australasia. A translational research consortium created to complement BIG's clinical research network, TransBIG, was founded by Dr. Piccart-Gebhart in 2004.