Training and education

Undergraduate medical training - Bangalore Medical College, Bangalore, India
Postgraduate training in paediatrics and paediatric haemato-oncology and leading to MD - Mumbai, India
Paediatric training - Wales and South London specialist training programme
Sub-specialty paediatric oncology training - Royal Marsden Hospital and Great Ormond Street Hospital, London
PhD in molecular haematology and cancer biology at the Institute of Child Health, University College London

Experience

Dr Ramanujachar is a consultant paediatric oncologist who joined the Trust in 2012. She previously held the same role at Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge. She's also an honorary clinical lecturer at the University of Southampton, where she teaches undergraduate students and supervises students doing projects to achieve a BMedSci (bachelor of medical sciences).

Dr Ramanujachar looks after children with a wide range of cancers, coordinating complex care and rehabilitation services as part of a multidisciplinary team. She sees both inpatients and outpatients, and also supports their families. Her special interests are in neuro-oncology (treatment for brain and spinal cord cancers), neuroblastoma (a rare cancer that mainly affects children) and late effects (health problems that occur months or years after cancer treatment has finished).

As a member of national team of experts in neuroblastoma, Dr Ramanujachar is able to support other clinicians to help their patients' families with complex decisions in the management of neuroblastoma. She's passionate about post-cancer treatment care for children, and coordinates their follow-up care to include monitoring of any late effects. She is also involved in helping patients transition from children's to adult services.

Roles

Trust roles

Lead for paediatric neuro-oncology services
Lead for paediatric late-effects services
Chair for the paediatric neuro-oncology and late-effects MDT

Regional and national roles

Core member of National Cancer Research Institute children’s cancer and leukaemia clinical sub-group (NCRI CCL CSG) neuroblastoma working group
Co-Chair of Children’s Cancer and Leukaemia Group (CCLG) Neuroblastoma Special Interest Group
Chair and co-ordinate the monthly CCLG National Neuroblastoma Advisory Panel meeting
Member of the European Neuroblastoma Research Network (SIOPEN)
Expert member of National Research Ethics Committee (NRES) for the Hampshire NRES A subcommittee

Awards and prizes

PhD fellowship awarded by the Children's Leukaemia Trust

Research

As the co-chair of the CCLG neuroblastoma special interest group, Dr Ramanujachar contributes to the development of treatment recommendations and clinical trials in neuroblastoma and dissemination to the other paediatric oncologists in the UK.

She is also a national coordinator for collecting information as a prospective registry on the diagnosis and management of children with spinal cord invasion with neuroblastoma. This is part of a European study looking to develop the best treatment recommendations.

Dr Ramanujachar was part of a team who set up an ENCCA study, a Europe-based study for collecting outcomes of infant neuroblastoma treated from 1999 to 2014. The study also aimed to expand the dataset collection by the National Cancer Registery in Oxford with Dr C Stiller in order to develop treatment guidelines for the management of infant neuroblastoma.

She is a co-investigator for PROMOTE study, a national study looking at Patient Reported Outcome Measures Online To Enhance Communication and quality of life after childhood brain tumour.

Dr Ramanujachar has contributed abstracts to a number of national and international meetings

You can view a list of Dr Ramanujachar's publications here.

Contact

You can contact Dr Ramanujachar via her secretary, Lorraine Davidson - call 023 8120 4101 or send an email.