Specialization
Focus of research
Marloes Hoppen (1993) is PhD-candidate in clinical neuroscience in sports at both Emma Children’s Hospital and Alzheimer Center Amsterdam UMC. She is educated in Human Movement Sciences (BSc., cum laude), Physiotherapy (BSc.) and Human Movement Sciences: Sport, Exercise & Health (MSc., track: High Performance Coaching, cum laude). She has worked as physiotherapist in two Sports Medical Centers before starting her current PhD-trajectory.
Marloes is part of the Emma Neuroscience Group, led by prof. dr. Jaap Oosterlaan and dr. Marsh Königs, which investigates the impact of disease and treatment on the brain of children and young adults, and how this impacts daily life functioning. Her work is sponsored by the Royal Dutch Football Association (KNVB).
Persistent symptoms after Sports Related Concussion
At the Royal Dutch Football Association campus in Zeist (The Netherlands), Marloes is responsible for the management of the Concussion Clinic. This clinic offers a structured care path for athletes who have sustained a sport-related concussion. The clinic has been developed based on the Follow Me blueprint developed at the Amsterdam UMC. Under supervision of prof. dr. Oosterlaan and dr. Marsh Königs and in close cooperation with dr. Edwin Goedhart (Chief Medical Officer Royal Netherlands Football Association), his colleague sport physicians, and manual therapists, structured clinical data is collected at the Concussion Clinic as part of the primary care process, and re-used for care evaluation and scientific research. The resulting cohort of patients with persisting symptoms after sport-related concussion represents one of the largest in Europe. Marloes coordinates research projects aiming at unraveling the symptom heterogeneity of patients with persistent symptoms after a Sports Related Concussion (SRC), in order to further improve prognosis and provide insights for more targeted treatment strategies.
Repetitive Head Impacts and Fluid Biomarkers of neural damage
Under supervision of prof. dr. Jaap Oosterlaan, prof. dr. Charlotte Teunissen, dr. Jort Vijverberg, and dr. Marsh Königs, Marloes is also in charge of the HEADLINE-study. This study investigates the effects of heading in football on fluid biomarkers of neural damage. In cooperation with the Royal Dutch Football Association, a large prospective observational study has been set up, for which a total of 12 matches for higher-level amateur players were organized, including a total of 340 players. Blood was drawn before, directly after and two days after the match. The relation between heading exposure and multiple state-of-the-art blood biomarker levels will be investigated. The results of this study will contribute to our knowledge regarding the safety of football heading and have strong relevance for policy development in football. The results are expected to be published in 2025.