Joana graduated from medical school in Portugal (Faculdade de Medicina de Lisboa) in the top decile of her class in 2013. She moved to the UK in 2015 to pursue a career as an academic urology trainee and in 2016 secured a position as clinical research fellow at the Specialist Centre for Kidney Cancer. After passing the mandatory exams, Joana became Member of the Royal College of Surgeons of England in 2017. Joana is passionate about improving outcomes for kidney cancer patients and is currently doing her PhD in immunology in early kidney cancer under the supervision of Ms Maxine Tran, having received a MRC Clinical Training Research Fellowship to accomplish this.