Susanne Vijverberg, PhD
Department of Respiratory MedicineAcademic Medical Center, University of Amsterdam
Meibergdreef 9, 1105 AZ Amsterdam
The Netherlands
Email: s.j.vijverberg@amc.uva.nl
Asthma has a major impact on patients and their caregivers. As a respiratory and pharmaceutical scientist I am fascinated by the promise of biomarkers to tailor asthma treatment, and I am dedicated to improve asthma management through research and teaching. EAACI plays a pivotal role in fostering collaboration between clinicians and researchers, as well as educating the next generation. Since 2011, I am an EAACI junior member and experienced firsthand how important the EAACI activities are for early career professionals.
In 2014, I completed my PhD on “Treatment Response in Childhood Asthma” at the Division of Pharmacoepidemiology and Clinical Pharmacology (group of dr. Anke-Hilse Maitland - van der Zee, Utrecht University, the Netherlands) and at the Department of Respiratory Medicine (group of prof. dr. Leo Koenderman, University Medical Center Utrecht, the Netherlands). During my PhD, I have combined immunological, pharmacogenomics and epidemiological approaches to identify biomarkers to guide pediatric asthma treatment and presented my research at various EAACI congresses. As part of my PhD training, I visited the group of prof. dr. Colin Palmer at the Ninewells Hospital and Medical School, Dundee University (Dundee, UK) as a guest researcher.
After my PhD, I became a post-doc/lecturer at Utrecht University. I obtained my academic teaching qualification, as well as a short-term research grant to start up the Pharmacogenomics in Childhood Asthma consortium (PiCA). Currently, international researchers of 22 pediatric asthma studies take part in the PiCA consortium. In addition, I became a board member of the Netherlands Network of Precision Medicine. In October 2016, I was appointed as an Assistant Professor at the Department of Respiratory Medicine in the newly established research group of prof. dr. Anke-Hilse Maitland- van der Zee at the AMC (Amsterdam, the Netherlands). I am involved in various precision medicine studies, including the PUFFIN trial (a RCT on genotype-guided asthma treatment) and the pan-European SysPharmPediA research consortium (focusing on systems medicine approaches in childhood asthma). I have co-authored > 25 PubMed indexed scientific articles and currently supervise 4 PhD students. As an early career researcher in the asthma field, I feel honored to represent the voice of the junior members in the Asthma section!
Last updated 02 August 2017