Executive Board
The EONS Executive Board acts in the capacity of trustees and conducts the affairs of the European Oncology Society (EONS) in accordance with the policies determined by the Members and the Advisory Council.
Johan de Munter
(Belgium)
Johan De Munter is currently working as a nurse manager at the University Hospital Ghent Cancer Center. He has been a registered nurse in oncology-haematology for 21 years, was a member and board member of the Flemish society of cancer nurses, is a member of BHS nurses group and an individual member of EONS since entering the profession. During his early years as an oncology nurse, he specialised and obtained a postgraduate degree in pain management and continued his studies with a postgraduate degree in oncology. In 2010, he transferred to University Hospital Ghent to continue in a nurse consultant role for the haematology/stem cell transplant unit and has since expanded his expertise in healthcare provision and patient education, supportive care needs, adolescents and young adults with cancer, transition and survivorship care with a focus on evidence-based cancer nursing, quality of care, advocacy and communication. In 2016, he continued to specialise and completed a postgraduate certificate in Teenage/Young Adult Cancer Care at Coventry University in the UK, and recently finished a postgraduate degree in leadership. Johan is currently a board member in the Majinhuis, a community support home for people affected by cancer. He is also a member of the steering committee and a permanent teacher on the Flemish training program for adolescents and young adults, and is a frequent guest teacher in various postgraduate courses for nurses and allied healthcare professionals. He is co-chair of the Flemish strategic AYA movement advisory group, an active member of the Belgian Haematology Society nurses committee, a member of the SIOP Europe AYA Committee, and a member of the Belgian Federal Council of Nursing. After several roles in the European Oncology Nursing Society, he became the President of the organisation in January 2021 and is committed to enhancing the field of nursing by building together and advocating for innovative care, education and research for the benefit of all cancer nurses and improvement of the overall quality of life for people with cancer.
Virpi Sulosaari
(Finland)
Virpi graduated as a registered nurse in 1993, later specialising in hematology nursing. She joined the academic community after working as a registered nurse for over 10 years, mainly in hematology and cancer departments. Virpi did her masters and doctoral degree in nursing science at the University of Turku, Finland. Currently, she is a principal lecturer in the Professional Master School of Health and Well-being at Turku University of Applied Sciences, Finland and is also a post-doctoral researcher there. Her fields of expertise are related to cancer nursing, palliative care and under- and postgraduate nursing education and research.
Wendy Oldenmenger
(The Netherlands)
Wendy H Oldenmenger RN MSc PhD, is a registered nurse and health scientist. She started her clinical career as a specialised pain nurse in a comprehensive cancer center, part of the Erasmus University Medical Center (MC) in the Netherlands. After clinical experience, she was interested in how to improve patients’ pain management and therefore she conducted several patient-related research projects.
Currently she works as an assistant professor of pain and palliative care at the Erasmus MC Cancer Institute, where she is also the coordinator of (hemato-) oncology nursing research. Her research focuses on symptom management and patient empowerment. In addition, she works as a senior lecturer at the University of Applied Science Rotterdam in the Netherlands.
In addition to being a Board Member of the European Oncology Nursing Society (treasurer) she is a Member of Board of Board of Directors of the European Cancer Organisation. She is also the co-founder of the Cancer Nursing Fund.
Andreas Charalambous
(Cyprus)
Andreas Charalambous, BSc, MSc, PGCert (Research), PhD (Oncology Nursing), started his nursing career in 1995. He obtained his BSc in Nursing Science in 1999 by the Northumbria University (U.K), his MSc (Nursing Science) in 2002 and his PhD (Oncology Nursing) in 2008 from Middlesex University (UK). He has a proven track in academia since 2004. Ηe is the Chair of the Nursing Department at the Cyprus University of Technology where he works as an Associate Professor of Oncology and Palliative Care and he also holds the position of an Adjunct Professor at University of Turku (Finland). He is the founder and Past-President of the Cyprus Oncology Nursing Society, European Oncology Nursing Society (EONS) Past-President and European Cancer Organization President-Elect. He is also the Founder of the Cancer Nursing Fund (https://cancernurse.eu/cancer-nursing-fund/). He is involved in National and International research programs (HORIZON2020, ERASMUS+, COST) in various fields of cancer care. Examples of externally funded projects include: PI in the ERASMUS+ project PROLEPSIS (https://prolepsis.eu/), SAVE (https://www.projectsave.eu/save/) and PI (Cyprus team) in the ERAMUS+ project HERO (https://hero-erasmus.csl.gr/) and eLILY (https://elily.eu/about-the-project/), PI (Cyprus team) in the HORIZON project INCISIVE (https://incisive-project.eu/)
He has published over 150 National and International publications in esteem journals. H-index 32 and i10-index 66
https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=P13f8NsAAAAJ
Merel van Klinken
(Netherlands)
Merel van Klinken graduated as a nurse in 2006. She has been working as a registered oncology nurse since 2009 and is currently also working as a palliative care nurse in a specialised oncology hospital in the Netherlands. She holds an MSc in nursing sciences and is looking to improve the quality of palliative care in her own hospital setting and in the Netherlands as a whole. She’s passionate about safety for patients and nursing staff and building resilience among young cancer nurses. She teaches within the speciality training area for cancer nurses in her own hospital. Merel is a member of the EONS Advocacy Working Group and is an Executive Board Member since February 2021.
Amanda Drury
(Ireland)
Dr Amanda Drury is an Assistant Professor in the School of Nursing, Midwifery and Health Systems, University College Dublin and Fulbright-HRB Health Impact Scholar 2020/21. She is currently an EONS Board Member, and co-chair of the Research Working group. Amanda has over a decade of clinical and academic experience in cancer nursing. Her research interests span the areas of supportive and palliative care in chronic illness, using quantitative, qualitative and mixed methods research approaches.
Wendy McInally
(UK)
Wendy has built a comprehensive portfolio around children and young people with cancer which covers practice, education, and research. She is a widely recognised cancer nursing specialist and has played a leading role in developing and implementing many best practice initiatives. As the United Kingdom (UK) lead for the new Children and Young People’s Nursing programme with the Open University (OU), she is responsible for developing and implementing the new nursing curriculum, including the cancer agenda. The OU is a public research university and the largest university in the UK for undergraduate education and one of the world’s leading universities. As a previous Macmillan Cancer Nurse (UK charity provider for people living with cancer), she has a deep understanding of the ongoing need for professional education to support evidence-based care delivery. In supporting healthcare professionals caring for people living with and beyond cancer, she strives to encourage the introduction of innovative courses and resources. She has been a member of the CCLG for over 20 years and was the previous chair between 2012 and 2017. She is an active member of TYAC and the Society of International Oncology of Paediatrics (SIOP), and as such is ideally placed to collaborate with colleagues from across Europe, continuing to develop cancer research, education, and practice initiatives. She has been a member of EONS since 2013. During that time, she successfully secured two leadership scholarships and a PhD writing retreat through EONS. She became a member of the Education Working Group (EWG) in November 2018 and Vice Chair in December 2020. In 2021, she became the EWG Chair and an Executive Board member and leads the EONS task group for developing a European College for Cancer Nurses (ECCN). She has successfully led the e-sessions for nurses delivered by the European School of Oncology (ESO) since 2018, and in 2020 developed three animations to align with the ESO resources. She also serves on the advisory board for ESO and regularly meets with them to discuss and promote cancer education for nurses and other healthcare professionals. In 2022, on behalf of the European Cancer Organisation’s Chief Executive, Mike Morrissey, and the Accreditation Council of Oncology (ACOE)’s Chair, Kim Benstead, Wendy was invited to join the ACOE council.
Nikolina Dodlek
(Croatia)
Nikolina has been an MSN cancer nurse since 2010, working as a lead nurse and shift manager of the sub-department for oncology and radiotherapy in University Hospital Center Osijek, in the Inpatient Unit with adult patients undergoing chemo, immuno and radiation therapy, as well as acute oncology and end of life care. Since 2015, she has also been working also at the J.J.Strossmayer University of Osijek, Croatia, as a teaching assistant and mentoring nursing students on cathedra for nursing and palliative care. During this period, she attained her bachelor degree in nursing and, in 2017, her Master’s diploma in nursing science. Nikolina is a Secretary, Co-founder and Executive Board Member of Croatian Oncology Nursing Society. She is also an EONS (from October 2019) and ESMO member. During 2020, in collaboration with and the support of the National Society, she established a Young Cancer Nurses (YCN) Network in Croatia, and started education for young cancer nurses, admitted and approved by the Croatian Nursing Council. In December 2020, she was elected as EONS YCN Co-Chair. In May 2021, she was elected as an EONS Executive Board Member (Young Cancer Nurse), and also represents EONS in ECO on Quality of Cancer Care. She is passionate about oncology nursing, evidence-based clinical practice, student mentoring, nursing and patient education and research, alongside direct patient care.
Matthew Fowler
(UK)
Matt graduated as a nurse from the University of Birmingham in 1997 and has worked as a cancer nurse since 1999. Matt is a consultant nurse for oncology and haematology at Birmingham Heartlands Hospital (part of the University Hospitals Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust). Matt’s particular interests lie in advanced practice in cancer nursing, vascular access care as well as the management of low risk febrile neutropenia. Matt holds an MSc in Nursing, a Post Graduate Certificate in Advanced Clinical Practice from Warwick university and has embarked upon his PhD journey. Matt regularly teaches both undergraduate and postgraduate nurses, including the higher diploma in oncology and palliative care nursing at Bethlehem University in Palestine. He also has a keen interest in promoting cancer nursing as a profession to undergraduate nurses. Matt can be followed on twitter @mattfowler751