Measuring Body Composition and Optimal Nutrition Support in the ICU Setting

Arthur R.H. van Zanten, MD, PhD is an internist-intensivist and serves as the Medical Director on the Hospital Executive Board for acute and complex care, the Deputy Chair for Intensive Care Medicine, and the Department Head for Intensive Care and Research at Gelderse Vallei Hospital in Ede, the Netherlands. There, he also chairs the research group ACTOR in the in Intensive Care Unit (ICU). Van Zanten is also a Professor of Nutrition and Metabolic Stress in the division of Nutrition & Health at Wageningen University & Research in Wageningen, the Netherlands. 

Prof. van Zanten’s research interests initially addressed infectious complications in critically ill patients, with particular attention to clinical, pharmacological, and economic aspects. He now focuses on critical care nutrition, especially immune-modulating nutrition in ICU patients. He has contributed to the field with distinction, having published 205 peer-reviewed articles and numerous other book chapters and medical publications. Currently, he is leading several (inter)national clinical trials as Principal Investigator. Previously, he was managing editor for a decade for the Netherlands Journal of Critical Care and is now an ASSOCIATE EDITOR for the Clinical Nutrition journal. 

He provided more than 400 lectures on critical care nutrition and sepsis between 2011 and 2020 in 29 countries. During this time, he was the invited keynote speaker at meetings for the European Society for Clinical Nutrition and Metabolism (ESPEN), the American Society for Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition, the International Symposium on Intensive Care and Emergency Medicine, the Brazilian Society of Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition, the Danish Association of Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition, the Colorado Society for Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition, the Chinese Society of Critical Care Medicine, and the Middle-East ICU Nutrition Summit. He has organized over 175 medical congresses. 

Prof. van Zanten is a member of the Working Group on Gastrointestinal Failure of the European Society of Intensive Care Medicine and the Practice Guideline Committee of ESPEN for Critical Care Nutrition for adults. He has contributed widely to the organizational aspects of Dutch Intensive Care, and he served as secretary of the executive board of the Netherlands Society of Intensive Care Medicine (NVIC). He chaired Fundamental Critical Care Support Netherlands for many years. He was the chair of the NVIC Committee on Intensive Care Quality until 2012.