Meet the Jury : How Can We Generate Evidence on Medication Safety in Pregnancy? From Self-Reported Data, Through Healthcare Utilisation Data, to Learning Health Systems by Prof. van Gelder, Prof. Cesta & Prof. Bérard

Meet the Jury Symposium: Prof. Marleen van Gelder (Radboud University), Prof. Carolyn Cesta (Karolinska Institutet) & Prof. Anick Bérard (Université de Montréal)

How Can We Generate Evidence on Medication Safety in Pregnancy?
From Self-Reported Data, Through Healthcare Utilisation Data, to Learning Health Systems 

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Date and time: Thursday, June 4th, 2026 – 14:00-16:00
Location: Promotiezaal, Naamsestraat 22, Leuven (We hope to welcome you in person, but online attendance is also possible)

The symposium is relevant for researchers across disciplines with a (pharmaco)epidemiological or real-world data interest that extends beyond the perinatal field. Topics include self-reported data, data validation, secondary use of administrative healthcare data, and learning health systems.

Registration: Complete this form
(or copy the following in your browser: https://forms.cloud.microsoft/e/jj565HSR0v)

Programme:

• 13:30 – Doors open
• 14:00 – Welcome
• 14:05 – Marleen van Gelder – “Self-reported data in pregnancy pharmacoepidemiology, with insights from validation strategies”

Dr. Marleen van Gelder is an Assistant Professor in Perinatal Pharmacoepidemiology at the Department for Health Evidence, Radboud Institute for Health Sciences, Radboud University Medical Center in Nijmegen, The Netherlands. She is also a Senior Researcher in Biostatistics and Pharmacoepidemiology at the University of Oslo. Her work focuses on perinatal epidemiology, with a particular focus on improving exposure and outcome assessment, longitudinal patterns, and causal inference methodologies. She serves as the scientific coordinator of the PRIDE birth cohort study in the Netherlands.

• 14:45 – Carolyn Cesta – “Administrative data in pregnancy pharmacoepidemiology and the need for advanced methods”

Dr. Carolyn Cesta is an Assistant Professor at Karolinska Institutet, where she leads research on the use and safety of medications during pregnancy. Her work leverages Swedish population-based registers and is conducted in close collaboration with international partners. She serves as Chair of the Executive Committee of the Nordic Pharmacoepidemiological Network and is actively involved in the NorPreSS/InPreSS consortium, a large-scale international collaboration producing high-impact evidence on medication use during pregnancy and reproductive health.

• 15:25 – Anick Bérard – “Building communities and learning health systems for medication safety in pregnancy”

Dr. Anick Bérard is a Full Professor at the Université de Montréal Faculty of Pharmacy. She holds the Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Medications and Pregnancy and leads the Research Unit on Medications and Pregnancy at CHU Sainte-Justine. As Director of the Réseau québécois de recherche sur les médicaments (RQRM) and Principal Investigator of large-scale collaborative programmes – including the Pan-Canadian CONCEPTION Study, the CAMCCO Active Surveillance Initiative, the CAMCCO-L Training Platform, and the French nationwide PregMed-France cohort – her work is deeply rooted in building research communities, training platforms and infrastructure for medication safety in pregnancy research.

Contact: Laure<dot>sillis<at>kuleuven<dot>be