Richard R. Barakat, MD, is the physician-in-chief and executive director of cancer services and research at Northwell Health’s Cancer Institute as well as senior vice president of cancer services. Dr. Barakat is an internationally recognized surgeon and clinical investigator. Prior to joining Northwell Health, he was chief of the gynecology service at Memorial Sloan Kettering (MSK) and held the Ronald O. Perelman Chair in Gynecologic Surgery. Dr. Barakat was the lead investigator on several influential research projects at MSK, including a study to compare the benefits of laparoscopic versus standard surgery for patients with endometrial cancer, a study evaluating symptomatic lower-extremity lymphedema in women treated for uterine corpus cancer, and a study testing the efficacy of the Gynecologic Cancer Lymphedema Questionnaire (GCLQ) in detecting lower extremity lymphedema symptoms.

Dr. Barakat, a professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the Donald and Barbara Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra/Northwell, is author or co-author of more than 340 peer-reviewed articles and numerous textbook chapters. He is also an editor of a surgical atlas on gynecologic cancer and the latest edition of Principles and Practice of Gynecologic Oncology, one of the leading texts in the field.

Dr. Barakat served as the vice chair of the Cancer Prevention Committee of the Gynecologic Oncology Group for five years. He served as an examiner for the American Board of Obstetrics and Gynecology and was the former president of the Metropolitan Gynecologic Cancer Society, the New York Obstetrical Society, the Society of Gynecologic Oncology, and the International Gynecologic Cancer Society.