Role and contribution

Dr Tumino leads the Ragusa cohort of EPIC and participates in InterAct through the case ascertainment and verification workpackages 1.1 and 1.2.


Scientific profile

Rosario Tumino is the Principal Investigator of Ragusa collaborating centre for the EPIC project. He is also the Director of Ragusa Cancer Registry (RCR) and senior pathologist at the Histopathogy Department of Ragusa Hospital. His involvement in the EPIC study is related to the activity of cancer registration; RCR has been providing data on cancer incidence since 1981, which have been published in the IARC scientific publication "Cancer Incidence in Five Continents" Vols. V, VI, VII and VIII, continuously showing low rates in comparison to other European registries; these data are coherent with cancer mortality rates which are independently computed by the national office of statistics. He believes that the low risk is largely attributable to the life-styles of the local population particularly with regard to the local variant of Mediterranean diet, rich in fresh vegetables and fruits: EPIC project represents an opportunity to validate this hypothesis. Data from Ragusa are from an unpolluted and non-industrialized geographical area where about 25% of population is occupied in agricultural jobs. RCR is the only EPIC collaborating centre where research activities has been performed by the personnel of a population based cancer registry recognized by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC).