May 12, 2021- Joseph Pater, Professor Emeritus at Queen’s University, is the recipient of the Canadian Cancer Society Lifetime Contribution Prize, a new honour from the Canadian Cancer Society (CCS). The award recognizes an esteemed Canadian investigator whose contributions, vision, and leadership have enhanced the Canadian cancer research landscape to significantly benefit the lives of people with cancer.
For over 45 years, Dr. Pater has been devoted to advancing clinical trial research aimed at improving the lives of cancer patients and to educating, training, and mentoring the next generation of students, fellows, and young investigators. Under his guidance, the Canadian Cancer Trials Group (CCTG) at Queen’s University has become one of the most well-respected cancer clinical trials networks in the world, producing results that have accelerated the development of new treatments and established new standards of care worldwide.
Sometimes called the “father” of cancer clinical trials research in Canada, Dr. Pater completed his medical training and accepted appointments in the Department of Medicine and, later, Oncology at Queen’s during a time when medical oncology was still in its infancy. In the early 1970s, Canadian oncologists began running cancer clinical trials with the support of the National Cancer Institute of Canada’s (NCIC) Epidemiology Unit. In 1980, NCIC established a formal collaborative research network, the NCIC Clinical Trials Group (now CCTG) and Dr. Pater was appointed as the inaugural Director. Over the next 27 years, his leadership transformed the CCTG from a small national program at Queen’s to the largest collaborative cancer clinical trials network in Canada. The team became the first Canadian research network with a developmental drug program, allowing them to lead new investigational drug trials that directly led to new cancer drug approvals worldwide.
Dr. Pater has played an active role in the development, execution, and analysis of over 500 multi-centre Canadian and international cancer trials involving more than 85,000 patients around the world. His 240 publications span the areas of hematology, oncology, statistical methods, cost effectiveness, and quality of life, and have been cited over 24,000 times for their insights on new drug and therapy development and patient-centered outcome measures.
As a Queen’s professor and mentor, Dr. Pater also acted as head of the Department of Community Health and Epidemiology, taught clinical trials courses to dozens of cohorts of students, and supervised numerous graduate students and fellows, many of whom have become emerging leaders in their own right.
After retiring from the CCTG, Dr. Pater served a three-year term as Vice-President of Clinical and Translational Research at Cancer Care Ontario, during which time he helped develop a new research chairs program and facilitated planning for provincial investments in cancer research. He has sat on numerous research advisory boards and selection committees in Ontario, Canada, and around the globe.
For his countless accomplishments, Dr. Pater has received multiple awards and accolades, including the Canadian Cancer Society’s Award of Excellence in Medicine and Health (2001), National Cancer Institute of Canada’s Diamond Jubilee Award (2007) and the Canadian Cancer Research Alliance’s Award for Outstanding Achievements in Cancer Research (2015).
For more information on the Canadian Cancer Society Lifetime Achievement Award, please visit the website.
