Professor dr. Johanneke Portielje is medical oncologist at the department of Medical Oncology at the Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC). She holds a chair in Geriatric Oncology.

More information about Johanneke Portielje

Professor dr. Johanneke Portielje is medical oncologist at the department of Medical Oncology at the Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC). She holds a chair in Geriatric Oncology.

Geriatric Oncology

Geriatric oncology studies the diagnosis and treatment of cancer in elderly patients. This relatively new field of research has developed as a consequence of the aging of developed societies and the resultant sharp increase of elderly patients in oncology practice in combination with the notion that treatment of elderly patients needs urgent improvement.
Research of cancer treatments traditionally had a focus on younger and healthier patients, resulting in lack of data to adequately guide treatment of older patients.

The research of the geriatric oncology group in the LUMC addresses the mechanisms that determine age differences in cancer development and treatment and predictive characteristics that may distinguish those older patients most likely to benefit from a given treatment from those who will not. The research group participates in the innovation themes Cancer and Life course. 

Academic career

After graduation from the Leiden University Medical School (LUMC), Johanneke Portielje was trained in internal medicine (LUMC / HMC Westeinde) and oncology (Daniel den Hoed Cancer Clinic / Erasmus MC Rotterdam) and wrote her thesis on Interleukin 12 in renal cancer patients (2002). She subsequently practiced oncology in the Hagaziekenhuis, a large teaching hospital in The Hague.

She made a transfer to the LUMC in 2017 and held her inaugural lecture titled “Searching for subtlety” on geriatric oncology on September the 18th 2017.

Publications