Exploring the performance of Dutch mental health care

Are you interested in mental health and motivated to help improve mental health care? Do you want to explore how the organization and financing of the Dutch mental health care system relate to its performance? Are you eager to use applied microeconometric methods and administrative data to evaluate mental health policy reforms? We are offering an exciting PhD opportunity to conduct empirical research into the performance of the Dutch mental health care system, which will have both academic and societal relevance.

Job description
The high and rising burden of mental illness has placed substantial pressure on mental health care systems. In the Netherlands, waiting times remain long, and access to appropriate care is not equally distributed - with vulnerable groups often facing worse access. Although various reforms have reshaped the organization and financing of Dutch mental health care with the aim of improving care, their actual consequences for care performance have not been systematically and empirically studied.

This PhD project helps to fill this gap by investigating how the organization and financing of mental health care in the Netherlands relate to its performance. Potential research questions are:

• What is the impact of decentralizing youth mental health care on (inequalities in) care use and outcomes?
• Do access to and quality of care differ by provider type?
• How do provider and insurer reimbursement relate to mental health care provision and outcomes?

This PhD project offers the chance to address societally relevant and urgent questions about the Dutch mental health care system, with findings that may inform future health policy. It provides flexibility in shaping the precise research questions, depending on the candidate’s interests, and offers opportunities to follow PhD courses and present research findings at (international) conferences.

The PhD candidate will be supervised by Lisa Voois and Marco Varkevisser and will join the Health Systems & Insurance (HSI) section at Erasmus School of Health Policy & Management (ESHPM), offering a supportive and multidisciplinary research environment. The preferred starting date is January 2026, but there is flexibility depending on the candidate’s availability.

We are looking for a motivated candidate who:

• Holds (or will soon hold) an MSc degree in a relevant discipline such as health economics, policy economics, or a related field with strong quantitative training.
• Has a strong interest in (and preferably experience with) applied microeconometric techniques.
• Has a good understanding of policy-relevant applied scientific research.
• Is comfortable (and preferably experienced) working with large-scale datasets.
• Has statistical software skills (e.g. Stata, R).
• Has strong communication skills in English, both written and spoken. Proficiency in Dutch is a plus, but it is not required.

We offer you an internationally oriented and varied job in an enthusiastic team, with excellent working conditions in accordance with the Collective Labour Agreement for Dutch Universities (CAO-NU).

The start date of this position is 01-JAN-2026 and you will be based at [class.26087] in Erasmus School of Health Policy & Management (ESHPM). This position is for 1 fte. The salary ranges from a minimum of € 3.059 to a maximum of € 3.881 gross per month Scale PhD on a fulltime basis (38 hours), in accordance with the CAO-NU. The contract is entered into for the duration of 4 years.

Everything else we offer you, you can find below!

• Everything you need for a good work-life balance: the option to work from home in consultation with your manager, 41 days of paid leave with a 40 hour contract, 8% holiday pay and an 8.3% end-of-year bonus, and a significant discount on a subscription for our on-campus sports centre!
• Sustainable, inclusive and diverse work environment with an open culture, where you can be yourself and we pay attention to each other and to the world around us. Make the most of our bicycle budget, or join networks such as Young@EUR, FAME or QuEUR.
• Time and space for your development in the broadest sense: development days and a personal career budget and free access to our university library.
• Good pension with ABP that EUR contributes 2/3rds towards, discounts on various collective insurances with Zilveren Kruis Achmea, Loyalis, and Allianz, and compensation for travel, working from home and home internet use.
• Are you currently combining your job with parenthood, or do you want to do so in the future? EUR offers partially paid parental leave and fully paid additional birth leave for partners, and our campus features a daycare (daycare not paid for by EUR).
• Moving to the Netherlands for your job with EUR? Then you may be eligible for the 30%-ruling if you meet the requirements of the Belastingdienst (Dutch tax agency), and with our Dual Career Programme we will also help your partner find the right job for them.

Erasmus University Rotterdam (EUR) is an internationally oriented university with a strong social orientation in its education and research, as expressed in our mission ‘Creating positive societal impact’. EUR is home to 4.100 academics and professionals and almost 33.000 students from more than 140 countries. Everything we do, we do under the credo The Erasmian Way – Making Minds Matter. We’re global citizens, connecting, entrepreneurial, open-minded, and socially involved. These Erasmian Values function as our internal compass and create EUR’s distinctive and recognizable profile. From these values, with a broad perspective and with an eye for diversity, different backgrounds and opinions, our employees work closely together to solve societal challenges from the dynamic and cosmopolitan city of Rotterdam. Thanks to the high quality and positive societal impact of our research and education, EUR can compete with the top European universities. www.eur.nl.

Faculty / Institute / Central service
ESHPM is leading within the Netherlands with its teaching and research activities, focusing on economics, policy and management topics in healthcare. ESHPM offers a bachelor programme, five master programmes, a transition programme for lateral entrants and postgraduate education. Since its foundation in 1982, ESHPM has closely linked research and education. Knowledge and experience from various scientific disciplines such as economics, law, socio-medical sciences, organizational studies and public administration are brought together and applied to healthcare. This multidisciplinary approach to education and research is unique. ESHPM is housed in the Bayle (J) Building on EUR's Woudestein campus in Rotterdam. More than 1500 students study and 160 employees work at ESHPM. Internationalization is highly valued at ESHPM.

The research group of Health Systems & Insurance (HSI) focuses on theoretical and empirical policy-relevant research on the structure, financing and performance of health systems and health insurance markets and the role of health insurers as purchasers of health care. The research group is an international frontrunner in research on risk adjustment. Other prominent themes are the design and impact of provider payment systems, patient and health plan choice, and the organisation and regulation of health care markets.