NSW Premier’s Awards for our cancer researchers

University of Sydney researchers were successful in four out of the five categories of the NSW Premier’s Awards for Outstanding Cancer researchers including the 2021 Outstanding Cancer Researcher of the Year.

The awards honour the achievements of the individuals and teams that work across the cancer research sector to lessen the impact of cancer.

Professor Jacob George, who was named 2021 Outstanding Cancer Researcher is a renowned liver specialist and research scientist delivering high-impact research on liver cancer, the diseases that lead to it and associated clinical cancer care.

Liver cancer is the second fastest growing cancer type in Australia and the fastest growing cause of cancer deaths by percentage. Two-thirds of people diagnosed with liver cancer have viral hepatitis, which can be treated to reduce the risk of liver cancer developing.

Professor George is making pioneering contributions to the development of a whole-of-system approach to liver cancer control, including reducing variations in care, using the Cancer Institute NSW model of research translation. These include:

• generating new population-level insights into the link between viral hepatitis and hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), the most common type of primary liver cancer, in western Sydney
• testing and implementing a shared-care model of HCC surveillance, and trialing its efficacy and effectiveness
• disseminating research insights to promote system-wide change.

Professor George is the Robert W. Storr Chair of Hepatic Medicine at the University of Sydney and is based at the Westmead Institute for Medical Research’s Storr Liver Centre. He received a prize of $50,000 from the Cancer Institute NSW.

NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet introduced the Awards, thanking every cancer researcher across the state for their contribution.