Paul Van Royen

Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, Primary and Interdisciplinary Care, Belgium

Academic Background

PhD or equivalent, MD or equivalent

Qualification

General Practitioner/Family Doctor

Short Bio

Paul Van Royen, MD, PhD, is Professor Family Medicine in the Department of Family Medicine and Population Health (FAMPOP)- Research group Primary and Interdisciplinary Care. After graduating as a general practitioner in 1983, he started up an inner-city practice with his wife Lieve Peremans, later on grown into a group practice. From 1987 till 1993, he was research assistant at the Institute of Tropical Medicine, department of Microbiology and STI. In 1993 he finished his PhD thesis entitled " Vaginal discharge and bacterial vaginosis in family practice" and was honoured with the Price of the Dutch College for the Study of STDs. His academic work is directed at teaching and research in primary care. He is coordinator of several teaching modules and programs, on undergraduate level as well as on graduate and postgraduate levels. At his department, he developed a research centre with strong expertise qualitative research and several research lines, each developing projects, collaboration and a growing output (research of education, respiratory tract infections, diabetes, interprofessional care, palliative care and sexual health including STI and contraception). He was/is contractant in different international projects, funded by the European Community (Forum project, Improve, TRANSFoRm). As co-chair in different South Initiatives, he stimulated the development of a stronger and more integrated primary health care in Central and South Africa, as well as in Ecuador. He is author of more than 250 articles in peer-reviewed journals and reviewer of different scientific journals. He had presentations at different international congresses. He was President of EGPRN (the European General Practice Research Network) from 2004 till 2010, the WONCA network for Primary Care research in Europe. He was dean of the Faculty Medicine and Health Sciences from 2012 till 2018. At this moment he is chair of the department of Family Medicine and Population Health (FAMPOP). Since 1996 he is coordinator of the Clinical Guidelines project for primary care in Belgium. As chairman of the Advice Centre for Child Abuse and his involvement in many other local networks, he has a close contact with the broad field of primary health care.