Dr. Franco is James McGill Professor in the Departments of Oncology and Epidemiology & Biostatistics, Director, Division of Cancer Epidemiology, and Interim Chair, Department of Oncology, at McGill University's Faculty of Medicine, in Montreal, Canada. Formerly, he was a faculty member at the French-language Université du Québec (1989-94) and Senior Researcher and Head of the Epidemiology Unit at the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research, Sao Paulo, Brazil (1985-89).
He holds B.Sc. (1975) and Licentiate (1976) degrees in biology from Universidade de Campinas, Brazil, and master's (MPH) and doctoral (DrPH) degrees in public health microbiology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (1981-84). He was a Guest Researcher at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, in Atlanta (1980-81 and 1983-84), and a post-doctoral fellow in cancer epidemiology during 1984 at the International Agency for Research on Cancer in Lyon, France, at the U.S. National Cancer Institute (NCI) in Bethesda, and at Louisiana State University, in New Orleans.
Professor Franco's research during the last 27 years has focussed on the following topics: molecular epidemiology and prevention of cervical cancer and human papillomavirus-associated diseases, cancers of the upper aero-digestive tract, prostate, endometrium, and childhood tumours; studies of epidemiologic methods for evaluating efficacy of cancer screening strategies; the impact of measurement error in epidemiology; and studies of societal and clinical influences on cancer patient survival. Much of his research has been international, with collaborative projects in Canada, Brazil, the Congo Republic, United States, and with the International Agency for Research on Cancer, in France.
His research has been funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), the US National Institutes of Health, National Cancer Institute of Canada, and Fonds de la recherche en santé du Québec (FRSQ). As of May 2012, he had published or had in press 352 scientific articles and 55 chapters, edited two books on cancer epidemiology and prevention, and co-edited 10 journal supplement issues. Many of his articles have appeared in premier biomedical journals, such as The Lancet, Journal of the American Medical Association, New England Journal of Medicine, Journal of the National Cancer Institute, British Medical Journal, and PLoS Medicine. He made 553 presentations as invited speaker or session chair in national and international conferences and in seminars in academic or clinical departments throughout the world (404 offered abstracts presented in conferences not included in the above).
He has served in the editorial boards of American Journal of Epidemiology (1993-98), Cancer Detection and Prevention (2001-08), Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention (1995-), Epidemiology (1993-2009), International Journal of Cancer (2009-), Medical and Pediatric Oncology (2000-04), PLoS-Medicine (2004-), Preventive Medicine (2008-), Oral Diseases (2005-10), among other biomedical journals. He has served in several scientific or grant review panels for the above agencies and for several national and international health organizations, as well as a consultant to the pharmaceutical and biotechnology sector on cancer screening and prevention.
He has mentored 85 graduate students and post-doctoral fellows since 1985 and, in addition to his regular teaching at McGill, he has taught several short courses on cancer epidemiology and best practices in scientific publishing in the US, Latin America, Europe, Southeast Asia, and the Middle East. He has served as member of and occasionally chaired organizing or program committees for 40 national and international conferences on epidemiology, infectious diseases, and oncology themes. He chaired the organizing committee for the 16th World Congress of Epidemiology, in Montreal in August 2002 and was Honorary President for the EUROGIN Congress, Monaco, February 2010.
His awards include: Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada (2011); McLaughlin-Gallie Award, Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada (2011); Lifetime Achievement Award, American Society for Colposcopy and Cervical Pathology (2010); Women in U.S. Government’s Presidential Leadership Award (2008); Distinguished Services Award of EUROGIN Society (2006); Canadian Cancer Society’s O. Harold Warwick Prize in cancer control research (2004); James McGill Chair (2002, 2009); CIHR Distinguished Scientist (2000); Educational Excellence at McGill University (2000); twice Montreal's "Ambassadeur du Palais des Congrés" (2000, 2007); FRSQ's "Chercheur National" Award (1999). He was elected representative (2002-05) for North America in the Council of the International Epidemiological Association. He was inducted to the Delta Omega and Sigma Xi honorary societies and received a superior Performance Award from the US Centers for Disease Control in 1984.
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Division of Cancer Epidemiology
McGill University
546 Pine Avenue West
Montreal, QC, Canada H2W 1S6
(southeast corner of Pine with University streets, diagonally opposite from the Royal Victoria Hospital)
Phone: +1-514-398-8014
E-mail: eduardo [dot] franco [at] mcgill [dot] ca (Email Dr. Franco) at eduardo.franco (at) mcgill.ca