March was Multiple Myeloma Awareness Month. In this short video, Cristina João, Haemato-oncologist of the Haemato-oncology Unit at the Champalimaud Foundation, explains what this pathology is and talks about the activities that the Unit has developed for improving the care of people with Multiple Myeloma. She also points out that, in addition to clinical activity, the Haemato-Oncology Unit does translational research through the Foundation's Lymphoma and Myeloma Research Group, which she leads.

In this video, Oriol Parés, Radiation Oncologist at the Champalimaud Foundation's Radiation Oncology Service, presents the advantages of the Watch and Wait (W&W) protocol in trying to avoid rectal surgery in low rectal cancer patients, sparing them from the decline of defecatory, urinary and sexual functions that can result from radiochemotherapy followed by surgery.

In patients with low rectal cancer, it may be necessary to completely remove the rectum. This implies permanently redirecting the colon towards an incision made in the abdomen, called a stoma. The patient is then fitted for life with a “bag” to collect stools directly through that artificial orifice.

In this video, nurse Tatiana Quaresma, of the stomatherapy team at the Digestive Unit, explains how the team’s intervention, before and after such a type of rectal surgery, is important in dealing with the physical and psychological impact of the procedure. 

Surgery continues to be central in colorectal cancer treatment.

In this short video, surgeon Pedro Vieira describes the state-of-art practice of colorectal surgery at the Champalimaud Foundation, with a particular emphasis on robotic surgery, the gold standard in rectal surgery, and minimally invasive surgery, which Digestive Unit surgeons favour whenever possible.

There are different ways to classify cancers: for instance, by the organ (or tissue) in which they originate, and by the type of cells they involve. Cancers can be solid (tumour-forming) or liquid (blood cancers).

Using the first method yields more than 200 different types of cancer. In alphabetical order, the most common are: bladder cancer, breast cancer, colon and rectal cancer, endometrial cancer, kidney cancer, leukemia (blood cancer), liver cancer, lung cancer melanoma (skin cancer), non-Hodgkin lymphoma, pancreatic cancer, prostate cancer, and thyroid cancer.

In 1975 (International Women’s Year), the United Nations recognised March 8 as International Women’s Day, but did you know that the date has been important to women’s rights since 1908, when hundreds of female workers in New York demonstrated to form their own union and demand the right to vote? Each year, this date reminds us to strive for a fairer society, regardless of gender.

February 22 is World Thinking Day, a date originally chosen in 1926 by the Girl Guides which now encourages everyone to take a moment to ponder the deeper questions and stand up for causes that could improve lives around the globe. 

Champalimaud Foundation (Fundação D. Anna de Sommer Champalimaud e Dr. Carlos Montez Champalimaud), a private, non-profit research institution in Lisbon, Portugal, is looking for a Senior Technician to join our team at the Champalimaud Research Program. 

The selected candidate will

Develop and use behavioral tracking systems combined with computational approaches and Drosophila neurogenetics to analyze the impact of neuronal and cell specific molecular manipulations on foraging computations.

Research Field

Neurosciences