Hilde Verbeek

Hilde Verbeek, PhD, The Netherlands
Director (2019-2023)

Dr. Verbeek is an Associate Professor at the Department of Health Services Research, within the Care and Public Health Research Institute of Maastricht University, the Netherlands. She is the Scientific Director of the Living Lab in Ageing and Long-Term Care. This is an interdisciplinary and formal partnership of Maastricht University with seven long-term care providers, Zuyd University of Applied Sciences and two vocational training institutes. For over 20 years the Living Lab has served as an infrastructure that drives scientific research in long-term care in co-creation with end-users, including older people and their relatives, health care professionals, policy makers and educators. The network covers approximately 110 long-term care facilities (e.g. nursing homes, assisted and group living facilities) as well as professional home care, and includes about 30,000 clients and more than 15,000 staff.

The research line of Dr. Verbeek focuses on innovations in long-term care for older people, especially dementia care. In particular, she studies effects of care environments (organizational, physical and social aspects) on clinical symptom presentation, taking a trans-disciplinary perspective (psychology, nursing science, gerontology). Examples include small-scale, homelike care environments and green care farms. Furthermore, she investigates effects on innovations in dementia care on staff and family caregivers and the broader societal impact. Methods used are both experimental (e.g. longitudinal clinical trials) and explorative (e.g. focus groups, interviews observations). Her research contributes to the development of evidence-based interventions and design in long-term care, and results facilitate training of front-line care staff, and supports policy makers in developing best practice strategies in organization of long-term care.