Fatima Cardoso, MD

Fatima Cardoso, MD, is director of the breast unit of the Champalimaud Clinical Center in Lisbon, Portugal. She is board certified in medical oncology and internal medicine. Dr. Cardoso worked for 10 years as assistant professor at the medical oncology clinic of the Jules Bordet Institute and served as the scientific director of the international research network TRANSBIG for 7 years. She returned to Portugal in October 2010 to create the Breast Unit of the Champalimaud Clinical Center, leading it to become the first certified breast unit in Portugal.

Dr. Cardoso’s research interests include biology of breast cancer, prognostic and predictive markers of response to systemic therapy, and new anticancer agents. She is actively involved in many breast cancer clinical trials. Dr. Cardoso is in many professional organizations including the European School of Oncology, the European Society for Medical Oncology, the European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer, the American Society of Clinical Oncology, and the American Association for Cancer Research, where she serves on several committees. She has served on the boards of directors of several organizations, namely ESMO, EORTC, and the European Cancer Organization.

Dr. Cardoso founded and is founder and president of the Advanced Breast Cancer Global Alliance and of the ABC International Consensus Guidelines Conference. She is editor-in-chief of The Breast Journal, associate editor of the European Journal of Cancer, and an editorial board member of several other journals. She has received several educational and research grants from the Breast Cancer Research Foundation, ESMO, ECCO, the Portuguese Science and Technology Foundation, the Portuguese League Against Cancer, the Portuguese Ministry of Health, the Free University of Brussels, the “Fonds Jean-Claude Heuson,” the Fondation Lambeau-Marteau, the Belgian Federation Against Cancer, the Susan G. Komen Foundation, and the European Union. She was awarded the prestigious Order of Santiago da Espada for Scientific Merit, from the President of Portugal in 2015. She has also received the Flims Alumni Club Lifetime Achievement Award 2011; the Prix Nice–St. Paul 2017, for the work developed for Advanced Breast Cancer Patients; the Reach to Recovery International Health Professional Award 2019 for exceptional contributions by a health professional in the field of breast cancer support; and the ABC Award 2019, in recognition of her foresight in understanding the importance of advanced breast cancer and for launching a global alliance against it. Dr. Cardoso has authored about 300 publications and has presented her work nationally and internationally.