Directors' Message

Dr. Sudeep Gupta

The Advanced Centre for Treatment, Research and Education in Cancer is in a phase of rapid evolution even as Tata Memorial Centre is itself evolving. The main mandate of ACTREC has been to conduct locally relevant research that will advance our knowledge of cancer biology as well as produce results that will be useful in management of patients. In this respect ACTREC has a proud legacy, including in its earlier incarnations as the Indian Cancer Research Centre and Cancer Research Institute. To mention just one landmark, the first description of association of tobacco with a human cancer (esophageal) was the report by Sanghvi, Rao and Khanolkar in the British Medical Journal in 1955. There have been many other achievements, scientific and otherwise, in the past decades. However, it is now time to look into the future.

Several new projects are on the verge of completion within ACTREC. These will transform ACTREC in the near future into a very large and niche cancer hospital with about 900 beds. The projects are technologically and thematically complex including a Proton Beam Therapy Centre, a Centre to treat children’s and hematological cancers, a Centre to treat solid tumors and an advanced centre for nuclear medicine. ACTREC will become the specialized hub of TMC where patients will come from all over India for complex treatments. Several challenges involving funding, logistics, engineering, human resource and others will have to be overcome before this becomes a reality. While overcoming these near-term challenges is crucial, we will have to remain focused on the long-term vision of our institution as a Centre that cares for cancer patients from all sections of the society, provides cost-effective and implementable solutions for oncology related healthcare problems facing our society, creates specialized human resource capacity for the country, and produces top class science.

For this we need all hands on the deck.

Dr. Sudeep Gupta
Director, ACTREC