Dr.W.Jaap Willems MD,PhD, Orthopaedic surgeon

Expert Clinic, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Dr Willems graduated from the Free University in Amsterdam in 1974.
Before starting his orthopaedic training in 1979, he worked for 4 years in a missionary hospital in Mwambani, wilaya ya Chunya, Tanzania.

In 1985, after his residency at Leiden University, he joined a group of orthopaedic surgeons in Alkmaar. In 1998, he moved to OLVG, a large teaching hospital in Amsterdam, where he was requested to become head of the orthopaedic department.

He finished his PhD thesis on the Gerard double cup uncemented hip prosthesis in 1988, a clinical, radiological, histological and biomechanical study.

Early in his orthopaedic career, he became interested in the pathology of the shoulder and elbow.

He founded, with 2 colleagues, the Dutch Arthroscopy Society in 1990 and also founded the Dutch Shoulder and Elbow Society in 1999. He started an arthroscopy and arthroplasty cadaver course on shoulder and elbow in 1991, which is running this year for the 33^rd time.

His scientific interest have lately focused on kinematic analysis of shoulder arthroplasty and visualising bone defects in shoulder instability.

He has published more than 100 articles in peer reviewed journals as well as book chapters.

He has been active in several committees as well in the board of directors of ISAKOS.

He has served in the Executive Committee of the SECEC from 2001 to 2010, from 2004-2008 as General Secretary and from 2008-2010 as President.

He has taught in many countries, especially India. He was invited for the first time in 1995 by Dr Rajan in Combaitore and since then has been in India, until the Covid epidemic, nearly every year and was awarded an honorary membership by the Indian Arthroscopy Society.

He retired from the OLVG hospital in 2011 and was honoured by the Queen of the Netherlands for both his efforts to promote shoulder surgery in The Netherlands as well as his orthopaedic activities in Africa and India, becoming a Knight in the Order of Orange Nassau.

From 2012 till 2020 he worked in a private clinic in Amsterdam. He is still a visiting consultant at the International Knee and Joint Centre in Abu Dhabi, UAE.

He is married to Neline Veldhuijzen van Zanten, an artist and they have 4 sons, 2 of them doctors, as well as  9 grandchildren.

Programme ISES meeting Saturday 27th January 2024

Adjudicators: Ms Michelle Clarke. Mr Cormac Kelly, Mr Muiris Kennedy