Anaesthesia and cancer care

Professor Vijaya Gottumukkala is a Professor of Anesthesiology and Perioperative Medicine at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center (MDACC), Houston, USA. He currently serves MDACC as the institutional lead for enhanced recovery programs, as the Medical Director for the Program for Advancement of Perioperative Cancer CarE (PACE), and as an Associate Head for the Institute for Cancer Care Innovation (ICCI).

Professor Vijaya Gottumukkala is actively engaged with the professional societies at the state, national and international level. He serves as the scientific and education committee Chair for the Texas Society of Anesthesiologists (TSA); as an alternate delegate from TSA to the American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA); on the Board for the American Society for Enhanced Recovery and PeriOperative Medicine (ASER-POM), currently serving as the President-Elect; and as an advisory member for evidence based perioperative medicine-USA.

Professor Gottumukkala initiated an international collaborative on perioperative care of the cancer patient and Chaired the inaugural global conference on perioperative care of the cancer patient, in November 2012 in Houston, Texas; and has since organized annual meetings on perioperative care of the cancer patient all over the world.

Professor Gottumukkala started the first Cancer Anesthesia Fellowship Program in the US at MDACC in 2011. The program has so far graduated 11 Fellows, 3 of whom currently serve as faculty members in the department of Anesthesiology and Perioperative Medicine at MDACC.

Professor Vijaya Gottumukkala’s main research and academic interests are perioperative management strategies to improve postoperative and oncological outcomes, enhanced recovery protocols in major cancer surgery, and to develop onco-anesthesiology as a specialty. He is widely published and has delivered keynote addresses and over 200 invited lectures all over the world.

Professor Vijaya Gottumukkala is currently a reviewer for multiple national and international journals; is an Associate Editor for British medical Journal Anesthesiology; has served as a guest editor for special issues of the journals of Current Oncology, Anesthesiology Reports, and Best-practice-and-research-clinical-anaesthesiology on topics related to cancer care and perioperative medicine. He served as the lead Editor for a textbook on “Perioperative Care of the Cancer Patient”.

Professor Bernhard Riedel is an academic anaesthesiologist and the Director of the Department of Anaesthesia, Perioperative Medicine, and Pain Medicine at Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre in Melbourne, Australia. He holds a Professorial appointment at the University of Melbourne. His research is focused on enhanced preoperative risk stratification and optimization of modifiable risk (prehabilitation) to reduce the ‘hidden pandemic’ of complications and death after major surgery. Specific to cancer surgery, he is a thought leader in a global collaborative on oncoanaesthesia. In this regard, his research explores the interaction of perioperative adrenergic-inflammatory response and anaesthetic technique on cancer progression.

Dr Morriss is the current President of the World Federation of Societies of Anaesthesiologists and Chair of the World Federation of Societies of Anaesthesiologists Board and Council. He served as Chair of the Education Committee from 2012-2016 and Director of Programmes from 2016-2020.

Dr Morriss has been closely involved with the development and delivery of a range of educational programmes, including Essential Pain Management, Primary Trauma Care, Safer Anaesthesia Form Education and the World Federation of Societies of Anaesthesiologists Fellowship Programme.