Prof.dr. Dirk Donker

Organisation: UMC Utrecht & University of Twente
Position: Intensivist-Cardiologist & Professor of Cardiovascular and Respiratory Physiology 

COVID-19: Technical innovations in clinical practice

The economic burden of current health care expenditures progresses exponentially. Among those, Intensive Care (IC) constitutes a substantial financial load, while its accessibility is a broadly supported societal interest. Despite this pivotal socio-economic role, IC resources are strained to their limits for years, taken to the extreme in the corona pandemic and its aftermath.

This underscores the imperative need to create sustainable IC for the coming decades while assuring the highest quality. The shortage of qualified IC personnel remains a serious obstacle. Here, technology can significantly support complex and time-consuming tasks of the engaged personnel, such as individualized monitoring and tailoring of complex therapy. Reliable high-tech solutions can turn the tide and unlock staff towards other responsibilities in patient and familiy care and social guidance.

Biography

The chair of Cardiovascular and Respiratory Physiology (CRPH) at the faculty of Science and Technology of the University of Twente is specifically intended to stimulate translational research and education. This, in order to allow patients and health care professionals to maximally benefit from the latest ingenious technologies integrated into modern clinical practice. In this sense, I consider my academic-clinical ambitions equally important as my dedication to professional education in technical medicine, biomedical technology and medicine. I am indebted for the opportunity to combine my professorship with a position as a senior staff member and intensivist-cardiologist in the Intensive Care Centre at the University Medical Centre Utrecht. The care for patients with acute and life-threatening disease remains complex and challenging. My experience from daily critical care underlines my enduring personal aspiration to advance technological innovation and improve clinical practice.