Consortium
The NEED consortium constitutes a complementary and interdisciplinary group of researchers, some of them pioneers in their field of research. The consortium covers the different scientific disciplines of the project.
Project partners
Irina Cleemput | KCE | Project Lead
Irina Cleemput, PhD is senior health economist and scientific programme director at KCE and has led several projects related to priority setting for reimbursement and unmet medical needs. Her work has led to several publications in peer-reviewed journals (orcid) as well as externally validated scientific reports published on the website of KCE (link). She has been involved in EUnetHTA since the start of the network, as representative of KCE, is member of the EU HTA Network Coordination Group as Belgian representative and represents KCE as associated partner in the steering committee of the International Horizon Scanning Initiative (IHSI). At KCE, Irina has established the patient involvement procedures and network within KCE and collaborated on several occasions with NIHDI (e.g. unmet medical needs programme – development and pilot testing of a multi-criteria decision approach to appraise unmet medical needs). She has chaired the HTA and Payers’ stakeholder advisory group within PREFER (IMI project on incorporating patient preferences in medical product decision making along the medical product lifecycle that ran from 2016-2022) and co-chaired the work package on the recommendations. Since 2019, Irina is part of the management team of KCE, as director of the scientific programme.
Robby De Pauw | Sciensano | Project Co-Lead
Robby De Pauw, PhD MSc is a senior researcher at Sciensano and guest professor at Ghent University, Belgium. He conducts policy-driven public health research in the domain of composite measures of population health and health inequalities. At Sciensano, he is developing the Belgian National Burden of Disease Study, and is involved in several national projects aiming to valorise and strengthen the Belgian health information system (often including linkages between different data sources). The past few months, he played a key role in COVID-19 surveillance and reporting, and is actively exploring options to further valorise the data collected during the crisis. Robby De Pauw holds a PhD degree in Health Sciences (Ghent University) and MSc degrees in Biostatistics (Ghent University) and Rehabilitation Sciences (Ghent University). He is keeping his statistical knowledge up-to-date and is currently working on projects that assess mediators and moderators in respect to social inequalities, whiplash, and COVID-19. To date, Robby De Pauw is involved in the supervision of 7 PhD students, has guided over 80 MSc students during his career, and has published over 50 peer reviewed journal articles. Although still at an early stage of his research career, dr. Robby De Pauw has successfully coordinated the national seroprevalence study at Sciensano, and the Belgian Burden of Disease study (BeBOD). He has won several research rewards at (inter)national conferences, has an h-index of 18 according to Google Scholar. His work has been widely cited, and a full list can be found here.
Charline Maertens de Noordhout | KCE | Principal Investigator
Charline Maertens de Noordhout, PhD is an expert in Health Services Research at KCE since 2018. She was part of to the team who developed a methodology to identify patients' needs in Belgium (Maertens de Noordhout et al. 2022) and collaborated to various KCE projects (link). She is currently involved in the preparation of the high-level conference that Belgium will organize in the context of the Belgian EU Presidency. Before working at KCE, she had been involved in several health conditions/diseases prioritisation exercises and projects aiming at evaluating the burden of diseases at a global and Belgian level.
Muriel Levy | KCE
Muriel Levy, PhD is an expert in health economic analysis at KCE since 2022. She is currently involved in the preparation of the fifth edition of the report on the performance of the Belgian health system. Before working at KCE, she worked as a researcher in healthcare management at Ghent University, and as a consultant for the WHO and the OECD. Furthermore, she has experience in quantitative data analysis using large health datasets and in performing literature reviews. Muriel Levy holds a PhD in Population Health and a MSc in Global Health Science and Epidemiology from the University of Oxford, and a BSc in Economics from the London School of Economics and Political Science.
Laurence Kohn | KCE
Laurence Kohn, PhD is senior expert in sociological analysis at KCE since 2004. She is specialized in qualitative research methods and has created and is responsible for the qualitative research cell at KCE. Her work has led to several publications in peer-reviewed journals as well as externally validated scientific reports published on the website of KCE (link), mainly in health service research. She participated actively in the development of the patient involvement processes. She was part of to the team who developed a methodology to identify patients' needs in Belgium (Maertens de Noordhout et al. 2022) In addition, she has been involved in EUnetHTA. Laurence holds a PhD in Public health and a MSc in Social sciences.
Claudia Schönborn | KCE
Claudia Schönborn is a medical doctor and clinical expert at KCE since January 2023. She is in the final stages of completing a PhD at ULB on the social inequalities in perinatal health within the Belgian context. Her research examines the experiences of perinatal healthcare services of migrant women and the pregnancy outcomes of undocumented migrants. Before joining KCE, she conducted a mixed-methods study on the patient experiences of women with breast cancer in the UK (Imperial College London) and was involved in mental health research in low and middle-income countries (King’s College London). She has also worked as a teaching fellow in epidemiology in London and in Brussels. Claudia Schönborn holds a Master of Science degree in Public Health from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and a Bachelor of Medicine and Surgery from King’s College London.
Mats de Jaeger | KCE
Mats de Jaeger, PhD is an expert in Health Services Research at KCE since March 2023. He has obtained his PhD at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel on the topic of neuromodulation in failed back surgery syndrome. To obtain this degree he conducted a nationwide registry (DISCOVER) in patients with failed back surgery syndrome treated with spinal cord stimulation, focused on patient-reported outcomes, quantitative data analysis and predictive analysis. Thereafter he worked as a consultant and clinical manager to improve efficiency, (clinical) processes and (clinical) pathways within several healthcare organizations. Mats De Jaeger holds a Master degree in Rehabilitation sciences and a PhD in Medical sciences.
Nathalie Swartenbroekx | KCE
Nathalie Swartenbroekx was an expert in economic analysis at KCE from 2004 to 2012. Since 2013 she is coordinator/facilitator of KCE research projects. In particular, she has been involved in all projects related to patient involvement and patient needs.
Rani Claerman | Sciensano
Rani Claerman is a young graduate that recently started working for Sciensano as junior researcher. During her education in biomedical sciences at Ghent University, she gained interest in public health. She is currently working on the Belgian National Burden of Disease Study at the Health information service of the epidemiology and public health department in Sciensano.
