Katrine J. Emmertsen defended her PhD thesis called 'Low Anterior Resection Syndrome - Bowel dysfunction after treatment for rectal cancer' in September 2013, and has since then, supervised several PhD students, junior researchers as well as continued her own research in the areas of function and quality of life after treatment for colorectal cancer. She is the primary developer of the LARS score – a simple scoring system for evaluating bowel function after sphincter-preserving surgery for rectal cancer.

She is a board member of the Late Sequelae Clinic at Aarhus University Hospital, Denmark, the leading institution in Denmark regarding late sequelae after colorectal cancer treatment.