Professional background

Dr Martin Forster is an associate professor at UCL and consultant medical oncologist at University College Hospital. He specialises in thoracic and head and neck cancers and has a particular interest in drug development and in using the increasing understanding of cancer biology to design studies that distinguish patient populations most likely to gain benefit from new drugs and new drug combinations.

He is a core member of the lung and head and neck cancer teams and runs a research-based practice, being principal investigator or chief investigator for over 50 early and late-phase clinical trials, from first-in-human to registration Phase III trials. These include targeted therapies in precision oncology trials, novel immunotherapies, and more recently solid cancer cell therapy studies.

He collaborates broadly with national and international groups involved in translational research and is joint lead for the clinical trials theme of the Cancer Research UK Lung Cancer Centre of Excellence and chairs the NIHR Head and Neck Research Group. He is the UCLH clinical lead for chemotherapy services and co-lead for the London Cancer Chemotherapy Expert Reference Group.