Professor Anthony Chan, Pro-Vice-Chancellor and Li Shu Fan Medical Foundation Professor of Clinical Oncology, has been bestowed the European Society for Medical Oncology Lifetime Achievement Award for his lifelong dedication to and outstanding research work in nasopharyngeal cancer, making him one of the three Asian scholars to have received the prestigious award for cancer researchers.

With among the highest incidence rates in Asia and being prevalent in southern China, including Hong Kong, nasopharyngeal cancer is one of the most aggressive head and neck cancers. Professor Chan joined the Faculty of Medicine in 1993 after specialist training in medical oncology in the UK. His journey towards applying the modern integrated treatment approach that combines radiotherapy and chemotherapy to locally advanced nasopharynx cancer began in 1994 with the first randomised trial, which saw a boost of five-year survival rates from 59% to 70% compared with radiotherapy alone. The trial made concurrent chemotherapy and radiotherapy the standard of care in the world.

The professor conducted further trials in the 2000s and provided randomised data supporting the efficacy of neoadjuvant—that is, pre-operative—chemotherapy in locally advanced nasopharyngeal cancer. Since 2019, the incorporation of neoadjuvant treatment has become the standard practice.

Professor Chan’s research team has also achieved many firsts in nasopharyngeal cancer research, including unveiling the prognostic value of post-treatment Epstein–Barr virus DNA and using the biomarker to gauge the risk of patients for adjuvant therapy, translating epigenetic therapy for nasopharyngeal cancer patients, and more.

Professor Chan has published reviews in various international journals including The Lancet and Nature Reviews Clinical Oncology, and delivered hundreds of international lectures, as well as devising the European Society for Medical Oncology’s nasopharyngeal cancer treatment guidelines. He has also taken up leadership roles in oncology service and research in Hong Kong, being currently the director of the Sir YK Pao Centre for Cancer at the Prince of Wales Hospital, director of the Hong Kong Cancer Institute and chief director of the University’s Phase 1 Clinical Trial Centre, among others.

At the award presentation ceremony, Professor Chan delivered the lecture “East Meets West: My NPC Journey” to review the significant milestones in the management of nasopharyngeal cancer in the past three decades and the future development. He thanked the Society for the honour, as well as his research team and global collaborators for their unwavering and immense support in advancing cancer research over the past 30 years. He pointed out that immunotherapy is a hot topic, and the team is looking to find more active combinations of different immunotherapeutic agents in days to come.