A personal touch of Joost Drenth

20 December 2017

Joost PH Drenth is an European citizen and works at the department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology as the current chair. The research theme is Renal disorders.

When you were a kid what did you want to be when you grew up? Can you tell us something about your child years. 

I really wanted to be that striker in a professional soccer team that scores the decisive goal in the competition that makes the audience roar. Unfortunately my technical soccer skills are poor (although I won the local soccer championship of my elementary school as a reliable bench warmer). I grew up in the south of the Netherlands and enjoyed long days without iphone, ipad or internet.

What was your previous academic training, where did you study and why that study? 

My life started in earnest upon entering medical school in Maastricht. I was part of one of the early cohorts after opening of the University and that left lot to be explored. I am not sure whether Medicine was a complete conscious decision, my grandfather was general practitioner, as was my father, many of my uncles and my sister. To be a physician gives me the opportunity to be close to people in times when they most needed it. I help patients to navigate the rough waters of life and illness with my aim to improve their quality of life. That is what it is all about, living life to its fullest. To be there when it really matters is a privilege.  

The RIMLS motto is ‘Today's molecules for tomorrow's medicine'. What does this mean for you? 

As a physician I can make the difference to someone’s life to give the right drug at the right time. In the past I have seen patients die because of infectious hepatitis and I could not do anything. That gave me such a helpless feeling. Today, I can treat and cure these patients, because researchers worked hard towards discovery. That is how we collectively may make the difference.

Who is your great example as scientists? And please give a motivation why.

I was afraid that this question was coming. Well, I have worked at the NIH, Bethesda, MD and met with Irwin Arias. He must have been in his seventies still working at the bench and he told me : Joost I do not want the brownies, I just want that my student learn and that they get the accolades. Irwin was the first editor of the journal “Hepatology” which has evolved to a high impact journal. At the NIH he started the pathobiology track for PhD’s as well as the “Demystifying Medicine for PhDs”.  For me, he exemplifies someone who has built a bridge between medicine and basic science.
(N Engl J Med. 1989;321:972-4)

Which research discovery that you have made has made you most proud? 

I discovered the genes for a couple of rare disorders, but what makes me most proud is that we found a treatment for patients with a polycystic liver disease and that we were able to design a patient reported outcome measure. This instrument, PLD-q, is a questionnaire that maps the disease activity in these patients. We are on our way to get FDA approval. This is an uphill battle with bureaucracy but it will benefit patients in the end.

Given unlimited finance what experiment would you perform?

I would cure patients with primary sclerosing cholangitis. This is an incapacitating disease occurring in young adults that cripples their liver. There is no treatment, and when as physicians we just wait to see the patients deteriorate. It is intolerable that anno 2017 we just cannot treat a liver disease such as primary sclerosing cholangitis. 

What does your working area (desk, office) look like and what does it say about you (or your research)?

 I have a clean desk approach. No papers, no letters no hardcopies. Sorry, but I scan everything and love my laptop for that.

Nominate a colleague to be in the spotlight and what would you like to ask him or her?

Willem Melchers, because of his recent and absolutely cool paper on Lab-in-a-tube: detection of influenza. Highly topical in these days of winter.

What type of person are you, quick insights:

a) Mac or PC?                                : PC without any hesitation
b) Theater or cinema?                 : Cinema
c) Dine out or dine in?                 : I cook, but like to dine out
d) Ferrari or Fiat?                          : VW
e) Shopaholic or chocoholic?     :  Online shopping , but without the chocolate (will use that for deserts)
f) Culture or Nature                     : Nature