History of the Department of Gynecologic Oncology
The Department of Gynecologic Oncology was established in 1927, the same year as the Center. Throughout its more than 80-year history, the Department has been home to outstanding clinicians whose work has shaped many areas of gynecologic oncology.
The first head of the Department was Dr Ivan N. Nikolskiy, a brilliant surgeon who introduced a number of important innovations in the techniques of extensive surgery. In 1934, he summed up his invaluable experience in a voluminous section dedicated to the diagnosis and treatment of gynecological cancers in the first edition of the manual titled ‘Malignant tumors’.
After Dr Ivan N. Nikolskiy, for the next 25 years the Department was headed by Aleksandr I. Serebrov, a member of the USSR Academy of Sciences who was the father of the Russian school of gynecologic oncology. Aleksandr I. Serebrov was the pupil of L.L. Okinchits and N.N. Petrov. Dr Serebrov’s publications were of utmost importance. His manuals ‘Uterine cancer’ (1957,1968) and ‘Gynecologic oncology surgery’ nurtured many generations of gynecologic oncologists. Dr Serebrov was gifted with many different skills and abilities; he was a talented surgeon and artist, who himself created illustrations for his books. Being a surgical virtuoso, Dr Serebrov taught his pupils to be delicate and gentle with tissues while operating, as if they were creating “not an oil painting, but a watercolor”.
Professor Vladimir P. Tobilevich made considerable contributions to treatment of uterine cancer. He was at the forefront of radiation therapy in gynecology in Russia. He was a gifted surgeon who had deep understanding of radiology and encyclopedic knowledge about many fields of human culture. Forty years of exemplary clinical and research work at the Center allowed him to create unique techniques of radiation therapy of uterine cancer and endometrial cancer, these techniques being based on standardized care and personalization.
Many issues relating to the diagnosis and treatment of ovarian tumors and trophoblastic diseases were explored by Professor Irina D. Nechaeva. In 1959, Irina D. Nechaeva wrote a D.Sc. thesis dedicated to the issue of establishing the biological mechanisms leading to ovarian tumors and the treatment of ovarian tumors. In 1965, she initiated the establishment of a unique, world’s only department specializing on ovarian tumors. This department housed an international WHO center for study of ovarian tumors, with Professor Nechaeva becoming its Head. Professor Nechaeva’s monographs ‘Treatment of ovarian tumors’ (1972), ‘Ovarian tumors’ (1987) and ‘Trophoblastic diseases’ (1976) helped to improve the treatment of these serious diseases.
After V.P. Tobilivich, the Department was headed by Professor Yan V. Bokhman. He was a remarkable researcher who defined the key concepts in gynecologic oncology. He developed the idea of pathogenic variants of endometrial cancer, which allowed to use a patient-centered approach to treatment, thus achieving much better results. The results of his research were summed up in his D.Sc. thesis entitled ‘Сlinical and pathogenic reasoning behind competent treatment of patients with endometrial cancer’ (1971).
Being a gifted surgeon, Y.V. Bokhman mastered extended operations for endometrial cancer and vulvar cancer. At the same time, it was Y.V. Bokhman who for the first time established a possibility in principle to cure highly differentiated endometrial cancer by using hormone therapy alone.
The seminal works of Professor Bokhman defined the further developments in gynecologic oncology, and the principles and ideas presented in them are being successfully introduced into clinical practice by the professor’s pupils, among whom are Professor A.F. Urmancheeva, E.V. Bakhidze, B.V. Vasiliev, V.V. Bezzubenko, N.G. Shashkova, N.A. Mikaya and many others.
In 1996, Sergei Ya. Maksimov, a pupil of Professor Bokhman, was appointed the new head of the Department. At that time the Department pursed research into such issues, as the role of different types of human papillomavirus as a cause of ER-negative endometrial cancer, the justification of existence of virus-driven and hormone-driven forms of ovarian cancer, and the use of organ preserving treatment of cervical cancer. The Department developed a procedure for neoajuvant chemoradiation therapy as part of combination treatment of stage IB2-III cervical cancer and intraperitoneal hyperthermic chemoperfusion for ovarian cancer.
In 2010, the Department entered a new era of minimally invasive surgery. Minimally invasive surgery is experiencing rapid growth in oncology at the moment. There is still some competition between upfront surgery and laparoscopic surgery, therefore one of the promissing ways of the evolution of endoscopy-assisted surgery with a view to possible make it the gold standard in cancer treatment is to integrate it in combination and multimodal treatment plans.
Since 2013, the Department has been headed by Professor Igor V. Berlev, D.Sc.