Joost Swart

Joost Swart is an Associate Professor in Clinical Paediatric Rheumatology.

He is a board certified Paediatrician Immunologist & Rheumatologist and Scientific Researcher Epidemiologist. 

He also works as the Coordinator of one of the 24 European Reference Networks (ERN) for rare immunological disorders: https://ern-rita.org/

He is a Member of the Scientific Advisory Council for the National Health Care Institute (Zorginstituut Nederland; ZIN)

After receiving his Medical Degree (cum laude/ with Honour) from the University of Groningen, he finished his training as a paediatrician at the VU Medical Center in Amsterdam. His fellowship paediatric rheumatology-immunology was completed in Utrecht. He worked as a paediatric rheumatologist for 3 years in both Reade and the VUmc in Amsterdam. In 2011 he came to work in the largest Dutch group of Pediatric Rheumatology / Immunology based in Utrecht where he finished his PhD thesis "Tailoring Treatment in JIA" in 2018. He graduated at the Utrecht University for a Master of Health Sciences grade in Epidemiology in 2025.

He is copromotor of 9 PhD students, 4 of which already have succesfully defended their theses. He also succesfully initiated more than 60 studentprojects and succesfully guided these students for their Bachelor and Master theses.

His research focuses on comparative effectiveness and safety of drugs, treatment-strategies and eHealth in juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA).  He is co-lead researcher of the international Pharmacovigilance database Pharmachild (over 9000 JIA-patients who have contributed their clinical data and thousands of blood and synovial samples) and is a.o. co-P.I. of the UCAN CAN-DU project https://www.ucancandu.com/  (>2,500 JIA patients with extensive data including health economy and thousands of biospecimens) and UCAN JUMP JUMP: de sprong naar genezing van jeugdreuma | ReumaNederland.

He is (co-)author on more than 120 scientific articles in peer-reviewed journals, several Chapters in Textbooks and several Guidelines and Recommendations. He is (co-)applicant on multiple successful large research grants (e.g. UCAN CAN-DU, UCAN-C, PAVE, SMART JIA, UCAN JUMP, UNIFIED).

He is council member of the Paediatric Rheumatology European Society, board member of PRESTAR (Trials and Registries of PRES), member of the Science Committee of the Dutch Pediatric Association, member of the Rare Disease National Mirror Group, member of the EULAR PAED Committee and Clinical Expert Member for C4Cs.

He is member of the Dutch Pediatric Association, Dutch Rheumatology Association, Paediatric Rheumatology European Society, and the Dutch Association against Quackery.

He educates students in both the CRU and Summa medical curricula in Utrecht. He trains interns, residents and fellows in paediatrics and rheumatology in UMC Utrecht. He is a certified instructor on the APLS-course from the Advance Life Support Group.