I aim to contribute to tailored and personalized supportive care for cancer patients, in particular head and neck cancer (HNC) patients. My research focuses on a) late effects, b) supportive care needs and c) the use and cost-effectiveness of (supportive) care.

My interest in supportive care started with my PhD-project entitled “Supportive care in HNC patients: patient-reported needs and costs”. After obtaining my PhD, I continued this research line. I am currently involved in various studies on the cost-effectiveness of supportive care interventions and am co-lead of the NET-QUBIC study: a multi-center longitudinal cohort study in which patient-reported outcome measures, fieldwork data (interview and tests) and biological samples (blood/oral rinse/saliva) are collected from 739 HNC patients and 262 informal caregivers from cancer diagnosis to 5 years after treatment. In 2020, I received a personal grant (KWF) to extend the NET-QUBIC cohort and to investigate late effects, supportive care needs and healthcare utilization among HNC patients. Recently, together with colleagues from the clinic, I received funding (MvdW) to implement a rehabilitation intervention targeting speech and swallowing in Dutch HNC care.

Besides my own research, I aim to facilitate HNC research by making NET-QUBIC data/samples available for other researchers. To this extend I am involved in the Amsterdam Cohort Hub. I am co-promotor of 7 PhD-students (4 obtained their PhD) and (co-)authored 75+ publications. I am member of the European Organization on Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC) Quality of Life group and treasurer of the Dutch Association for Supportive Care in Cancer (DASCC).

head and neck cancer, patient-reported outcome measures, cost-effectiveness, supportive care, cohort studies