1. Goals

§1. The Doctoral Program of Applied Medical Science at the Medical University of Vienna aims as a professional doctorate at the further development of the competence for self-employed scientific work in medical and medicine-associated professions. The goal is to maintain as well as to increase the university’s performance in applied research by a symbiosis of research and practice. Furthermore, the doctoral candidates shall acquire critical, analytic and argumentative skills within the program.

The professional doctorate has been designed for interested junior researchers as well as for practitioners seeking to relate research to biomedical and clinical practice development. The doctoral candidates are supervised by highly-qualified practitioners intending to research their own discipline and develop it further. The training and support of the scientific offspring is effected on the basis of a scientific attitude corresponding to the principles of the Medical University (GOOD SCIENTIFIC PRACTICE – Ethics in Science and Research, decision of the Faculty Council of the former Medical Faculty of the University of Vienna as of October 12, 2001 as amended) .

Emphasis is placed on instructed tuition (more than 21% of the duration of study) being and integral part and a key portion of the program for the impartment of practice-related skills in the respective medical field. The research part is equivalent to the PhD Program and shall result in an original doctoral thesis with accompanying publications in renowned journals. Particular importance shall be attached to the interdisciplinary of the topics. Thus, the professional doctorate provides the basis for the implementation, development and management of professional medical practice.

Upon completion of the doctoral thesis, the doctoral candidates shall correspond to the following profile for the application of science in the job. Thereby, candidates shall acquire the qualification to work in a specific field of medicine:
 a. Seek to apply knowledge in contrast to the basic-oriented PhD Program          candidates,
 b. Support of progress regarding theoretical and practical qualification at a high   standard,
 c. Knowledge of numerous biomedical methods and their application in medical research and practice,
 d. Continuous improvement of practice through research,
 e. Effectiveness as professional practitioners,
 f. Ability to assume personal responsibility and autonomous initiative in complicated and unpredictable situations in the specific field,
 g. Ability to plan, design, implement and adapt a research project with scientific integrity,
 h. Ability to give an opinion relevant to medicine in the specific field and to impart this opinion effectively to a specialist and a non-specialist audience,
 i. Ability, to promote technological, social and cultural progress within an academic and professional context in a knowledge society.