Gabriel Rinkel is professor of Neurology at the University Medical Centre Utrecht, the Netherlands. During his medical study he did 6 months extracurricular research at the Rudolf Magnus Institute in Utrecht on the effect of neuropeptides on behaviour, and was elected for an exchange program to study at the Addiction Research Foundation, University of Toronto, Canada. In 1991 he finished his clinical training in neurology and defended his PhD thesis on perimesencephalic subarachnoid haemorrhage.

Gabriel Rinkel is a clinician, teacher and researcher and has fulfilled and fulfils many managerial roles, including chair of the department. In 1997 he received the award “Teacher of the year” of the Faculty of medicine, and has supervised numerous master students and more than 35 PhD students.

Gabriel Rinkel is considered a world leading authority on subarachnoid haemorrhage and intracranial aneurysms. On this topic he has published more than 400 papers in international peer reviewed journals and has given lectures at more than 30 universities in 4 continents. He gives invited lectures and organises symposia at international conferences such as the World Congress of Neurology, the European Neurological Society, the World Stroke Congress, the International Stroke Congress, the European Stroke Organisation Congress, and he is a regular teacher at the European Stroke Organisation and European Association of Neurological Surgeons. He has written invited reviews for journals as the Lancet, Brain, and Stroke. He was principal investigator of the Magnesium in Aneurysmal Subarachnoid Haemorrhage trial, an international investigator driven trial that is up to now the largest drug trial ever performed in patients with subarachnoid haemorrhage.

Gabriel Rinkel has long lasting international collaborations with the University of Edinburgh, has been visiting professor at the University of Toronto, and is member of the guidelines committee for subarachnoid haemorrhage and chair of the guideline committee for unruptured intracranial aneurysms of the European Stroke Organisation. He has been awarded many scientific awards, has given the Stanley Davidson Lecture and the Honyman Gillespie lecture both at the University of Edinburgh, and the Karel Terbrugge lecture at the University of Toronto. In 2013 he was elected as Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh, and in 2020 he received an honorary doctorate at the University of East-Finland.

Research line

Stroke: subarachnoid haemorrhage and intracranial aneurysms

Most recent key publications

1: Etminan N, Chang HS, Hackenberg K, de Rooij NK, Vergouwen MDI, Rinkel GJE, Algra A. Worldwide Incidence of Aneurysmal Subarachnoid Hemorrhage According to Region, Time Period, Blood Pressure, and Smoking Prevalence in the Population: A  Systematic Review and Meta-analysis. JAMA Neurol. 2019 May 1;76(5):588-597

2: Etminan N, Rinkel GJ. Unruptured intracranial aneurysms: development, rupture and preventive management. Nat Rev Neurol. 2016 Dec;12(12):699-713.

3: Bor AS, Rinkel GJ, van Norden J, Wermer MJ. Long-term, serial screening for intracranial aneurysms in individuals with a family history of aneurysmal subarachnoid haemorrhage: a cohort study. Lancet Neurol. 2014 Apr;13(4):385-92.

4: Greving JP, Wermer MJ, Brown RD Jr, Morita A, Juvela S, Yonekura M, Ishibashi  T, Torner JC, Nakayama T, Rinkel GJ, Algra A. Development of the PHASES score for prediction of risk of rupture of intracranial aneurysms: a pooled analysis of six prospective cohort studies. Lancet Neurol. 2014 Jan;13(1):59-66.

5: Dorhout Mees SM, Algra A, Vandertop WP, van Kooten F, Kuijsten HA, Boiten J, van Oostenbrugge RJ, Al-Shahi Salman R, Lavados PM, Rinkel GJ, van den Bergh WM; MASH-2 Study Group. Magnesium for aneurysmal subarachnoid haemorrhage (MASH-2): a randomised placebo-controlled trial. Lancet. 2012 Jul 7;380(9836):44-9.

Chair guideline committee 'unruptured intracranial aneurysms' of the European Stroke Organisation

Visiting professor University Hospital Mannheim, University of Heidelberg, Germany

1: 1998 European Stroke Research Award
2: 1999-2004 Clinical Established Investigator from the Netherlands Heart Foundation
3: 2006 Stanley Davidson Lecture
4: 2013 Elected as Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh
5: 2016 Honyman Gillespie Lecture, University of Edinburgh, United Kingdom 
6: 2017 Karel G terBrugge Lectureship, University of Toronto, Canada
7: 2020 Honorary Doctorate University of East-Finland