2019

ECL2022 Honorary Award

Cancer Leagues recognise his hard work to elevate the standards of training and cancer care, promote multidisciplinarity & knowledge sharing for the benefit of cancer patients.

2019

Lifetime achievement award at 4th Vienna Breast Surgery Day (Vienna, 19th march 2019)

2016

Lifetime achievement award della European Society of Oncology Pharmacy (Amsterdam)

2016

Appreciation and gratitude award della Albanian Oncology Association (Tirana)

2012

Van der Schueren Award [lecture].

2010

The ESMO Award is conferred on an ESMO member who has made an outstanding contribution to the development of oncology in Europe and who recognizes the importance of promoting oncology as a specialty within the international community.

PRESS RELEASE
Top Cancer Specialists Receive ESMO Awards
Award Ceremony, 35th ESMO Congress, Monday, 11 October 2010

Dr Alberto Costa will be presented with the 2010 ESMO Award for his key role in the development of international guidelines for breast cancer and his ongoing commitment to the education of oncologists. This distinction is conferred on an ESMO member who has made an outstanding contribution to the development of oncology in Europe and who recognizes the importance of promoting oncology as a specialty within the international community.
Dr Costa’s many achievements include participation in the famous Milan Trial (local control and survival in early breast cancer), in the St. Gallen Consensus Report, and the development of chemoprevention. Scientific communication has also been an important part of his work.

On the current standard of care for breast cancer patients in Europe, Dr Costa highlights “the European concept of multidisciplinary care, which makes treatment safer. Europe also has the advantage of public national health so there is less inequality than in other parts of the world”. Last but not least, Dr Costa has supported various patient advocacy groups including the well-known ‘Europa Donna’ cancer coalition. “Patients nowadays are very aware and have a huge amount of information. Their participation in groups helps improve practice for example by helping us rewrite the ‘informed consent letters’ in a comprehensible language. Patients have also helped us to understand that oncologists need to improve their communications skills.”

Dr Alberto Costa MD, is the Coordinator of the Breast Surgery Unit at the Maugeri Foundation in Pavia, Italy, and Coordinator of the Canton Ticino Breast Unit, Lugano, Switzerland. He is a co-founder and Director of the European School of Oncology (ESO), Milan which he established in 1982, several years after graduating from the University of Milan (1976). He also played a key role in the creation of the Italian School of Senology in 1984 and the European Institute of Oncology, also in Milan, in l994. He has served as Secretary General of the European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC) and as a member of the European Commission’s Europe Against Cancer programme. He is Editor-in-Chief of The Breast journal and a member of the editorial boards of various cancer publications and author of over 250 publications.

Dr Josep Tabernero, Chair of the ESMO Fellowship & Award Committee, comments that “Prof Costa is a leader in his field and has changed clinical standards, which made him the ideal choice for the ESMO Award.”