Sandro Pignata
Division of Medical Oncology
IRCCS National Cancer Institute “Fondazione G. Pascale”
Naples
Italy
Sandro Pignata studied medicine at the University “Federico II,” Naples, Italy, where he graduated in 1986. He went on to specialise in Gastroenterology in 1990 and then in Medical Oncology in 1998.
In 1996 he obtained his PhD in Gastrointestinal Physiology at the University “La Sapienza” in Rome.
Since 1993, Dr Pignata has been a member of staff at the National Cancer Institute in Naples, where he is now the head of the Uro-Gynaecological Oncology Unit.
Dr Pignata is also president of the Multicentre Italian Trial in Ovarian cancer (MITO) group, that is the largest research group in the field of gynaecologic oncology in Italy and one of the largest in Europe, with more than 80 Italian centres involved in several randomised trials on the treatment of gynaecological cancer, whose results have been published in leading international journals. Through his work with the MITO group, Dr Pignata promoted translational research, creating in 2011 an independent network including 11 laboratories throughout Italy. The clinical researchers have successfully collaborated with such translational network, especially in the collection of cancer specimens for biobanking, aiming to identify both predictive biomarkers of response to treatment and prognostic factors in patients suffering from gynaecological malignancies.
Dr Pignata participated in the preparation of the national and international guidelines on the treatment of ovarian, uterine, cervical and renal carcinoma. He is the first author of several papers that have contributed to change the paradigm of gynaecological cancer treatment.
Dr Pignata is member of the ESMO Faculty Group in Gynaecological Cancers.
Dr Pignata is past president of the European Network of Gynaecological Oncological Trial Groups (ENGOT) that coordinates, promotes clinical trials within 24 trial groups and performs cooperative clinical trials on patients with gynaecological cancer. He is a member of the Italian Association of Medical Oncologists (AIOM) and Scientific coordinator of the Campania Oncology Network.