Gerrit Kwakkel MD, PhD

Professor Kwakkel received his Ph.D. in 1998 in Dynamics of Functional Recovery Post Stroke. Based on his work focused on the intensity of exercise therapy. He is responsible for the Dutch Stroke Guidelines with respect to Physical Therapy and Neurorehabilitation in the Netherlands and is one of the chairs of the Stroke Recovery and Rehabilitation Round the Table Group (SRRR). In March 2008, he received the first chair ‘Neurorehabilitation’ in the Netherlands at the Amsterdam University Medical Centre in Amsterdam. In addition, he is working as head of research at the rehabilitation center Reade of Amsterdam.

Kwakkel chair is dedicated to translational research in the field of neurorehabilitation with a special focus on the longitudinal relationship between brain plasticity and motor recovery early post-stroke. Professor Kwakkel published more than 260 papers with more than 15.000 citations in the field of stroke (Web of Science H-Index 61). Based on a prestigious laureate from the European Research Council (ERC), he became visiting professor at the department of Physical Therapy and Human Movement Sciences of the Northwestern University of Chicago, USA in 2015. In 2018, he received an honorary fellowship from the Associated Physiotherapists in Neurology (ACPIN) in the United Kingdom and the Outstanding Neurorehabilitation Clinician Scientists (ONCS) Award from the American Society of Neurorehabilitation.