Denise’s research focuses on socioeconomic inequalities in oral disease, the quality and appropriateness of oral health care, and strategies for improving oral health of populations, both in low and high-income countries.
She studies risk factors of oral diseases in vulnerable populations using health cohort data, including the ORANGE FORCE and MetaHealth projects. Her work also includes the development and evaluation of interventions to prevent dental caries, such as Uitblinkers (supporting families and parenting strategies to improve oral health behaviour) and SMILE (integrating oral health into centering care for pregnant women). Denise is also involved in research on school health policy in Southeast Asia through the Fit for School programme, for which she spent a year working in the Philippines.
Her teaching focusses on dental public health, evidence-based dentistry and communication in dental health care.
Denise is an editor at the Dutch Journal of Dentistry and has board experience at the Dutch Association of Pediatric Dentistry, the Amsterdam Young Academy and the congress organisation of the International Association of Pediatric Dentistry in Maastricht 2023.