Merel Hennink, was diagnosed with stage IV NSCLC in November 2014. Until april 2020, she worked as a program manager and a teacher at the University of Applied Science Groningen. But as advocacy work became more structured she decided to put her time and energy in the service of her family and advocacy for 100%.

Early 2015, she became active in the Patient Advisory Board of Longkanker Nederland (Dutch Patient Organisation), to be a face and a voice of Lung cancer in the Netherlands. Her international focus made her active on a European and Global scale. In 2018 she became an ambassador of Lung cancer Europe (LuCE, an European umbrella organisation of Patient Organisations) She is also the Dutch representan within the Global Lung Cancer Coalition (GLCC). She gives presentations on diverse platforms (ELCC, ESMO, WCLC etc.) and is active in diverse global patient councils.
To get more educated about her own driver mutation, she became active in the Global Initiative of the ROS1ders in 2015. In her own country, she started in 2016 the foundation Stichting Merels Wereld to raise (European) awareness about ROS1, and to get more research done. As a result, the Hanze University of Applied Sciences Groningen started a research course ´Merels Wereld´ in 2017. Stichting Merels Wereld, together with the Hanze University of Applied Science together and the University Hospital Groningen, initiated, created, funded and implemented a ROS1 research program.
Every year she give lectures to (medical) students about the engaged patient and the benefits to collaborate with them.