Judith Wellens, MD

Doctoral researcher

Judith Wellens graduated medical school at the KU Leuven in 2018, and subsequently started her internal medicine internship. Part of her training was performed at the University of Santiago (Chile), the Maria Middelares hospital (Ghent, Belgium), the AZ Nikolaas hospital (Sint-Niklaas, Belgium), and at the University Hospitals Leuven.

In October 2021 Judith Wellens started her doctoral research entitled ‘Impact of nutritional and microbial components on the pathophysiology of inflammatory bowel diseases’ under the supervision of prof. João Sabino and prof. Séverine Vermeire.

During the first year of her PhD, she worked at Oxford University in the lab of prof. Jack Satsangi and dr. Craig Thompson on serological responses to SARS-CoV-2 infection and vaccination in IBD patients. After this ‘covid detour’ of one year, she returned to Leuven to continue working on the main topic of her PhD.

Her research is translational in nature and focusses on dietary components and their impact on gut ecology, inflammation, and overall (bowel) health in IBD patients and otherwise healthy individuals. To perform this research, she received a grant from Flemish Association for Crohn and Colitis patients (CCV VZW).