Nikos Ioannou Memorial Lecture: The Rise and Fall of Liver Cancer
With the support of the Ioannou family, the University of Nicosia Medical School is establishing the Nikos Ioannou Memorial Lecture in memory of the late Dr Nikos Ioannou, a highly respected orthopaedic surgeon and an important figure in the development of healthcare in Cyprus.
The annual lecture will honour Dr Ioannou’s significant contribution to medicine, healthcare leadership and the development of healthcare services in Cyprus. He served as President of the Pancyprian Medical Association and was the first President of the Health Insurance Organisation (HIO), playing a leading role in the development of Cyprus’ national health scheme, GeSY.
Through the establishment of the annual lecture, the Medical School seeks to preserve and celebrate Dr Ioannou’s legacy and his contribution to the advancement of medicine and healthcare in Cyprus.
About the Inaugural Lecture
The inaugural Memorial Lecture, to be delivered by Dr Ioannou’s son, Professor George N. Ioannou, is titled ‘The Rise and Fall of Liver Cancer’ and will explore the changing landscape of the disease and advances in its prevention, diagnosis and treatment.
In his lecture, Professor Ioannou will analyse the past rise and recent decline in liver cancer incidence. Specifically, he will examine the reasons for the dramatic increase in incidence between 1975 and 2020, as well as the risk factors for liver cancer and the extent to which they are modifiable. He will also discuss why incidence has been declining since 2020 and what can be done to accelerate this trend. Ultimately, the lecture aims to reframe liver cancer as a largely preventable disease.
PROGRAMME
Professor George N. Ioannou
George Ioannou is Director of Hepatology and a Professor of Medicine at the University of Washington. He has served as Chair of the Practice Guidelines Committee and of the Public Health and Health Care Delivery group of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases. He is an Associate Editor of the Journal of Hepatology.
His long-term research interests include pathogenetic, epidemiological, methodological and clinical studies, including randomised controlled trials, in hepatitis C, fatty liver disease (MASLD), liver cancer and cirrhosis.
He is co-Chair of one of the largest ongoing randomised controlled trials of liver cancer screening. He is also involved in studies of current and novel liver cancer biomarkers, as well as research aimed at improving access to and adherence to liver cancer surveillance and investigating liver cancer risk stratification and risk-based surveillance.