Rengaswamy Sankaranarayanan

International Agency for Research on Cancer

Dr. Rengaswamy Sankaranarayanan is the Chief of the Cancer Screening Group at the International Agency for Research on Cancer in Lyon, France. Dr Sankaranarayanan has a MD degree in Radiation oncology followed by post doctoral training in the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Cambridge. After several years of experience in clinical oncology and cancer control in India, Dr Sankaranarayanan joined the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) in 1993. Through the Screening Group and Early Detection and Prevention Section of the IARC, and through innovative partnerships with other international organizations, national institutions and investigators, Rengaswamy Sankaranarayanan is involved in conducting several studies world-wide with the aim of providing scientific evidence to support the development of appropriate public health policies of screening for common cancers in a range of health care settings, particularly low- and medium-resourced countries. These studies provide valuable data on the accuracy, reproducibility, efficacy, benefits, harmful effects and cost-effectiveness of different screening interventions for cervical, oral and breast cancers leading to rational utilization of health care resources in the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of screening programmes. Rengaswamy Sankaranarayanan has brought to the Agency a vast international experience and knowhow on evaluating and disseminating different early detection strategies and in providing broad technical assistance in education, training and organizational aspects of cancer early detection programmes in low- and medium-resourced countries. He is an author in more than 200 papers in international peer-reviewed journals and his manuals on early detection of cervical cancer have been translated into several languages including Chinese, French, Hindi, Portuguese, Spanish and Turkish among others.