Job Verdonschot

Assistant Professor

Dr. Job Verdonschot is a resident at the Clinical Genetics department of the Maastricht UMC+ and an assistant professor at the Cardiology department within CARIM of the Maastricht University.

He finished both a master in biomedical sciences and medicine (cum laude) at the university of Maastricht, with a differentiation in cardiogenetics. In 2016 he received a Kootstra Talent Fellowship to start a PhD investigating the impact of genetic mutations on the clinical course of patients with dilated cardiomyopathy. His PhD thesis received three prizes for best thesis of 2021: by the Dutch association of clinical genetics (VKGN), the Durch association of cardiology (NVVC) and the CARIM research school of the university of Maastricht. In 2021 he started his clinical training to become a clinical geneticist in the Maastricht UMC+ with a differentiation in cardiology and cardiogenetics, which he will finish in 2025, continuing his career as clinical geneticist at the department.

In 2022 he received the prestigious Dekker grant (Clinical Scientist) from the Dutch Heart Foundation to start his research group investigating the impact of genetic mutations for asymptomatic family members. In 2023 and 2024 he also received the Academic Funds and a Veni grant of the NWO to further expand his research line focusing on early detection, improving risk stratification and early treatment, and reproductive options for patients and their family members with a genetic form of dilated cardiomyopathy.

He contributes to multiple national and international committees (for example, he is chair of the national Study Group on family care for cardiomyopathy patients of the National Heart Institute, and leads the writing of international consensus documents on family care and reproductive options from the European Society of Cardiology). He has a strong focus on interdisciplinary collaborations to achieve innovation in health care, depicted by collaboration with the Dutch Forensic Institute (NOFA study funded by ZonMW), the technical University of Eindhoven (as part of the Veni project) and hematology (focusing on clonal hematopoiesis as part of his ERA4HEALTH grant). His goal is to translate research innovations to clinical implementation to improve the care for patients and family members with genetic forms of dilated cardiomyopathy.