Yolanda van der Graaf

Yolanda van der Graaf studied medicine at the University of Utrecht , the Netherlands and graduated in 1977. She was trained as a tropical doctor and worked in the republic of Seychelles from 1980-1982 as community health officer. From 1982 till 1987 she worked at the Department of Epidemiology at the University of Nijmegen , the Netherlands where she was trained in clinical epidemiology and obtained her PhD degree in 1987 on ‘ Screening for Cervical Cancer’. In 1988 she was appointed as an assistant professor of clinical epidemiology at the Department of Epidemiology, University Utrecht. She was appointed in 2001 as a professor of Clinical Epidemiology, in particular Imaging. This chair was the result of a close cooperation between the Imaging Department and the Julius Center of Health Sciences and Primary Care (the former department of Epidemiology) both situated at the University Medical Center Utrecht. She is head of the section ‘Clinical Epidemiology’ within the Julius Center and since 2007 Director of Education of the Julius Center . Her main interest is cardiovascular disease. She is one of the principal investigators of the SMART study ( www.vaatcentrum.nl ). The SMART study is an ongoing prospective cohort study at the University Medical Center Utrecht, the Netherlands , including patients with symptomatic atherosclerotic disease. The study was designed to establish the prevalence of concomitant arterial diseases and risk factors for cardiovascular disease in a high-risk population, identify predictors of future cardiovascular events in patients with symptomatic cardiovascular disease. She has a particular interest in prediction research and screening. She is the principal investigator of a research programme in which the prognostic value of diagnostic imaging is examined in cooperation with 11 other centers. She has (co-)authored more than 250 papers in peer-reviewed journals. Under her responsibility 33 PhD students wrote and defended their theses.

Visits to the Department