My research is directed at changing lifestyle behavior of at-risk (patient) populations and implementation of such lifestyle interventions among stakeholders (e.g. health care professionals) and in organizations. A central research question in my work is “how can participants/patients change their lifestyle behavior and maintain this behavior on the long-term” and related to that question “what, works for whom, why, when and how”. In all projects I work with multidisciplinary teams and use mixed-method designs to study mechanisms, processes and effects.

My current research is related to the implementation of a lifestyle front office in Amsterdam UMC to integrate lifestyle is medicine in the treatment of patients by appropriately referring patients to community-based lifestyle initiatives. In this project we use principles from intervention development, value based healthcare and implementation research.

I am member of the section Quality and Organization of Care (QOC), and, section Health Behaviour and Prevention (HBP), of the Department of Public and Occupational Health.

QOC is a multidisciplinary section that aims to improve the quality and organization of public, curative, and palliative health care for citizens, patients and health care professionals, organizations and health care systems by performing research and translating scientific knowledge into practice, policy and education. Within this section my research falls with the research group Quality and Safety of Health care. This research groups aims to increase scientific knowledge on determinants at the organization, professional and patient level and to translate this knowledge to implementation of evidence based interventions. Specific themes are: patient safety in hospitals, safety II, teamwork, tools for teams, and value based personalized health care.

The section HBP has as mission statement: Promoting healthy behaviours in their broad societal context - to prevent health conditions and reduce health inequalities - through high quality and impactful research, education and dissemination. The aims of this section are to understand causes and effects of health behaviours and health inequalities; and, to identify, develop and implement solutions to improve health behaviours.

Lifestyle; behavioural change; value based healthcare; motivational interviewing; implementation; epidemiology; human movement science