The board members of ADHD Europe are elected at our Annual General Meetings and serve for a period of three years. The board is charged with working to ensure ADHD Europe fulfils its goals (as set out in the statues) and are responsible for the day-to-day management of the organisation.
To find out more about one of our board members, please click on their name.
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Dr. Myriam Bea
President
ADHS Deutschland 🇩🇪
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Andrea Bilbow OBE
Vice President
ADDISS 🇬🇧
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Hans van de Velde
Vice-President
Impuls & Woortblind 🇳🇱
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Christina Georgiadou
Secretary
ADHD Hellas 🇬🇷
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Chantel Fouche
Treasurer
ADHD, ASC & LD Belgium 🇧🇪
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Carola Stivala
Board Member
ADHD Malta 🇲🇹
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Hrannar Arnarsson
Board Member
ADHD samtökin 🇮🇸
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Viljo Wilding
Board Member
ADDISS 🇬🇧
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Nina Hovén-Korpela
Board Member
ADHD liitto 🇫🇮
Dr. Myriam Bea
President
Dr. Myriam Bea is Chief Executive of ADHS Deutschland e.V., the national ADHD advocacy group for people with ADHD and their families in Germany. She was a co-founder and past president of ADHD Europe and has been active as a volunteer for over 20 years.
After studying law, she graduated in medical malpractice in Cologne, Aachen and Bremen and practices as an attorney-at-law. She holds a magister degree in European Sciences from the University of Aachen and is a certified coach from the RheinMain University of applied sciences.
She trains and lectures as a lawyer and coach with a focus on ADHD.
She is a member of the VMWJ (Verband der Medizin-und WIssenschaftsjournalisten) and publishes for ADHS Deutschland e.V. the magazine “neue Akzente”. Myriam is author and co-author of several papers.
Contact Details
Email: [email protected]
Andrea Bilbow OBE
Vice President
Andrea Bilbow OBE is the founder and Chief Executive National Attention Deficit Disorder Information and Support Service ADDISS the national ADHD patient advocacy group in the UK and Over the past 20 years she has been supporting families affected by ADHD, developed programmes for training teachers and now trains practitioners to deliver behaviour management programmes to parents. Through ADDISS, she holds the UK licence for the 1 2 3 Magic programme.
Andrea trains and lectures internationally, and is involved in a number of ADHD research projects including an NIHR programme development grant to develop an online parent based intervention for ADHD. She is a member of the NIHR Healthcare Cooperative, MindTech, which is seeking to improve the use of technology in mental health, and was a member of NIHR Mental Health Research Network (MHRN) Clinical Research Group for Assessment and Treatment of ADHD which concluded that identification and assessment of children and young people with ADHD was a key research priority.
Andrea has raised two sons with ADHD, one of whom also has Asperger’s syndrome, and has a diagnosis of ADHD herself. The challenges of gaining access to care within the NHS and lack of support and advice in parenting her sons led Andrea to found ADDISS to help other parents.
In June 2013 she was awarded the OBE (Officer of the Order of the British Empire) by Her Majesty the Queen for her work supporting families with ADHD.
Contact Details
Email: [email protected]
Hans van de Velde
Vice President
In 2018, Hans was elected in the Board of ADHD Europe. Before he has been president of the Dutch dyslexia association and board member of Impuls & Woortblind, the association for people with ADHD, dyslexia, dyscalculia etc. From 2009 on he is the chair of the Science Committee of this association.
His current job is being a coach, amongst others for employees with ‘special brains’ like ADHD, autism, dyslexia and giftedness. He founded his company – Equisto – in Rotterdam in 1998 from the vision that brain properties like ADHD don’t just disappear in adulthood. Hans‘ company specialises in ‘people-at-work’ and offers professional guidance to employers and their employees, with a multidisciplinary approach and a focus on the talents of workers with these brain properties.
Hans’ interest in special brains stems from his own experience. After the usual hard years in primary and secondary school without being recognised as having dyslexia, he started working next to school at an early age. He cleaned offices, and at sixteen became assistant of the owner of the cleaning company. His second job was clerk to the court of justice. Later on in this court he became one of the first experts in legal text-processing and software in law. Next to his job, he studied law and got his masters in 1989.
In this period he got a burnout with anxiety problems. After a long period of therapy he did a three year education as trainer/therapist. And some years later, at last he got his diagnosis dyslexia and ADHD.
Hans was elected to the Board as an Ordinary Board Member in April 2018, and re-elected as Vice-President in April 2021.
Contact Details
Email: [email protected]
Christina Georgiadou
Secretary
Christina Georgiadou is President and co-founder of ADHD Hellas located in Greece, Athens. Christina joined the movement to raise awareness for ADHD after her sons were diagnosed. She has been a member of the ADHD Hellas board since 2009, its’ General Secretary since 2010, and President since 2015.
Along with other board members, she organises several awareness events and activities for spreading the knowledge on ADHD to individuals with ADHD and their parents, school teachers of primary and secondary education and mental health care personnel in Greece.
She joined ADHD Europe in 2012 with the mission of providing a strong and united patient voice and put the patients with chronic diseases at the centre of Greek and European Union healthcare policy and programmes.
Christina has also completed the Patient Expert Training Course of EUPATI. She sees partnering with patients, their families and advocacy groups essential to improving the quality, safety and sustainability of healthcare.
Contact Details
Email: [email protected]
Chantel Fouche
Treasurer
For the position of the Treasurer, I have professional experience with debtors, creditors, budgets and following through with administrative tasks related to the role. I have 14 year’s high level executive administration experience, and was a business owner in France for five years. I have contributed to the growth of ADHD Europe and shall continue to offer support to the Executive board for ADHD Europe’s aims & objectives. I am a member of the ADHD Awareness and Communications working groups for ADHD Europe.
Since 2017, I am the Secretary General of ADHD, ASC & LD Belgium, one of ADHD advocacy groups for people with ADHD, parents, teachers and their families in Belgium. We provide support, and education for ADHD and many neurodiverse conditions. We are actively involved in advocating for the patient’s voice at the European capital of Europe in Brussels with various awareness and activity events for the dissemination of knowledge about ADHD. I gave my first patient testimonial on World Brain Day (WBD) on 22 July 2019 talking about ADHD. We organised WBD in partnership with EFNA, and the European Brain Council. For WBD on 22 July 2020, our organisation hosted the event focusing on brain and mental health, with many endorsements from organisations on European level. I look forward to working with the Board to help professionalise lobbying for ADHD Europe at European Parliament and within the EU.
I am currently actively working on the ADHD and Women project. This project between ADHS (Deutschland) and ADHD, ASC & LD Belgium was awarded a grant by the European Federation of Neurological Associations.
I am a mother of two boys, of which my oldest, was diagnosed in 2007 with ADHD in South Africa where diagnosis, treatment and educational support knowledge contributes to the advocacy and awareness efforts that is much needed for ADHD in Europe.
Contact Details
Email: [email protected]
Carola Stivala
Board Member
Carola Stivala, (maiden name Falzon), was born in Malta however raised and educated in the Netherlands. She completed her Master of Arts Degree in Anthropology at the University of Amsterdam in 1999. Her specialisation was in “sustainable economic development and non-governmental organisations” in Latin-America. Her publication “Veldwerk in uitvoering” (IBSN: 90-5260-007-4) was published in 2001, and used in 6 Dutch universities for the last 10 years during the preparation for research study module.
Carola is married and has two teenage children, a Labrador dog, two cats and a bird.
In 2013, whilst living in Malta, Carola became involved with the local voluntary organisation, ADHD Malta, when she found that her son and other family members were diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), Attention Deficit Hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and dyslexia. To raise awareness and combat stigma about ADHD, Carola became active as honorary secretary of the group: writing funding proposals and executing projects, organising educational seminars for educators and parental skills courses for parents, introducing the national accredited course: “the ‘ADHD adult coaching approach’ in 2017, updating the website and publications and organising the monthly meetings for the group members, together with the committee.
Carola Stivala has joined the board of ADHD-Europe to help combat stigma and improve treatment options for any individual with ADHD within the EU, irrespective of age and their country of origin.
Contact Details
Email: [email protected]
Hrannar Arnarsson
Board Member
Hrannar Björn Arnarsson is the Executive Director for the Icelandic ADHD Association – the only ADHD organisation in Iceland, consisting of 3000 members out of population of 350.000. He is also chairman of the board in the Nordic Association and a member of the board in the Nordic ADHD group, Nordic Associations Network and The Icelandic Network of National Civil Society Associations.
Earlier, Hrannar worked as Secretary-General for a parliamentary group in the Nordic council, as an personal and political advisor to the PM of Iceland and as a member of the City Counsel of Reykjavík, so he has great experience in public and political field, both in Iceland, the Nordic countries and in Europe.
Hrannar have also, for over twenty years worked as managing director for his own sales and marketing company and as director of sales and marketing for some of the biggest media and publishing companies in Iceland.
Hrannar is married and has four children, at least one of them with ADHD.
Contact Details
Email: [email protected]
Viljo Wilding
Board Member
Viljo Wilding is the Tech Lead of ADDISS, the UK’s National ADHD Charity. Diagnosed with ADHD and autism in his teens, the challenges he faced in education and in accessing care inspired him to advocate for other young people with disabilities and their rights. Joining the ADDISS team at the age of 18, Viljo has worked to improve the charity’s use of technology and worked to update its policies to match IT in the 2020s. Over the past two years, he has contributed to the success of Broadcasting ADHD Europe in managing its streaming, recording, and editing, as well as leading the redevelopment of the ADHD Europe website and mailing systems.
In his role at ADDISS, Viljo also mentors young people with ADHD and chairs the ADDISS Youth Advisory Board, providing the charity and the research projects it is a part of with the voice of young people with ADHD. He is also a member of some of ADDISS and ADHD Europe’s research projects, contributing to the dissemination of research and digital strategy development.
Viljo was elected to the Board in April 2021 and previously served as Technical Advisor to the Board of ADHD Europe from 2020-21.
Contact Details
Email: [email protected]
Nina Hovén-Korpela
Board Member
Nina Hovén-Korpela is the Executive Director for the ADHD Finland located in Vantaa, Kuopio and Oulu. She is occupational therapist, and she has been studying also marketing and selling. Her last degree is Master of Health Promotion. Nina has been working in this organization nearly 9 years. These 9 years in ADHD Organization in Finland has been successful. The organization has strengthened its position thru this 9 year in the Finnish society a lot.
Earlier Nina has been working some years with elderly people, several years with child protection and she has also a long experience of human resource management and rehabilitation.
Nina thinks that it´s very import to raise awareness and better understanding of adhd. One good way to do this is to create places where we share information and support health professionals and public service who work with adhd people. Better understanding and management of adhd also improve quality of life. Together we make the change!
Nina is married and has 3 children and 5 grandchildren.
Contact Details
Email: [email protected]