Louis Denis
- Date of birth: 15/01/1933
- Date of death: 28/07/2021
BIOGRAPHY
Louis Denis was a Belgian urologist who dedicated his career to improving prostate cancer knowledge and decision making. He focused on early detection and empowering men to take informed decisions that balance the risk of dying from prostate cancer with avoiding unnecessary harms to quality of life.
After graduating from medical school at Ghent University in 1957, and completing his residency in surgery and urology in Antwerp, Denis went to the Medical College of Virginia in the US on a grant from the US National Institutes of Health to join the prostate cancer group.
He returned to Belgium for military service from 1964 to 1973, where he became chief of urology at Antwerp Military Hospital, and was decorated several times. Denis then chaired the urological department of Antwerp City Hospitals, and was appointed professor at the Flemish Free University of Brussels in 1978. In 1998 he was appointed director of the Multidisciplinary Oncology Centre Antwerp (MOCA) ‒ a position he held until the end of his life.
Together with Fritz Schröder, in Rotterdam, Netherlands, Denis was a founder of the European Randomised Study of Screening for Prostate Cancer ‒ the landmark trial on prostate cancer screening that started to enrol in 1994. The trial led to a better understanding of early diagnosis of prostate cancer. It showed that PSA screening to detect prostate cancer in its early curable stages leads to a highly significant reduction in mortality rates. But it also demonstrated that it is possible to identify potentially indolent, prostate cancers with a high degree of certainty, to minimise the dangers of overtreatment.
In other notable contributions to promoting research and education, Denis was also a founding member of the genito-urinary group of the European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC), and served as treasurer and president of the EORTC from 1988 to 1991. He cofounded the [European School of Oncology](@European School of Oncology) in 1982; in 1990 he helped launch the European Journal of Cancer; and in 2000 he was secretary general of the Union for International Cancer Control (UICC).
After he himself was diagnosed with prostate cancer, Denis played an important role in founding the European prostate cancer patient coalition, Europa Uomo, where he served on the executive committee until shortly before his death.
