Rate My Professor Steven Simeons

Steven Simoens is a full professor in the Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences at KU Leuven, affiliated with the Department of Pharmaceutical and Pharmacological Sciences in the Clinical Pharmacology and Pharmacotherapy group. He holds a degree in Commercial Engineering from KU Leuven obtained in 1997 and a PhD in Economics from the University of Aberdeen in 2001. With more than 20 years of experience, he serves as a senior full professor of health economics and head of unit.

Simoens specializes in pharmacoeconomics and health technology assessment, conducting health technology assessments, cost-of-illness analyses, economic evaluations, and budget impact analyses of chemical medicines, biological medicines, vaccines, advanced therapies, orphan medicines, biosimilars, and generics across various disease areas. His research also addresses pharmaceutical market access policy, including pricing, reimbursement, and managed entry agreements. He has authored over 566 peer-reviewed publications cited more than 15,600 times. Key publications include 'The broader benefits of vaccines: methodologies for inclusion in economic evaluation' (2024, Expert Review of Vaccines), 'R&D Costs of New Medicines: A Landscape Analysis' (2021, Frontiers in Medicine), 'How do biosimilars sustain value, affordability and access to biological medicines?' (2021, Expert Opinion on Biological Therapy), 'Market access of Spinraza (Nusinersen) for spinal muscular atrophy' (2017, Gene Therapy), and 'Use of economic evaluation in decision making: evidence and recommendations for improvement' (2010, Drugs). Simoens founded the KU Leuven Funds for Market Analysis of Biologics and Biosimilars following Loss of Exclusivity and Personalised Medicine Strategies. He leads ISPOR Special Interest Groups on orphan medicinal products and rare diseases and on biosimilars, serves on editorial boards of multiple journals, and is a Belgian representative in the EU Framework Programme Horizon 2020 COST action on shortages of medicinal products.