(Vienna, 1 July 2026) Thomas E. Dorner took up the Chair of Gerontology (§ 98) at the Center for Public Health at the Medical University of Vienna on 1 July 2026. With this new chair, MedUni Vienna is further expanding its research into healthy ageing, health promotion and care for older people.
Demographic change and rising life expectancy are among the key public health challenges of the coming decades. As the number of older people grows, so too does the need for effective strategies for health promotion, prevention and needs-based healthcare. At the same time, factors such as climate change, digitalisation and lifestyle trends are altering the context in which people age, presenting the healthcare system and society with new challenges.
Thomas E. Dorner’s academic work centres on health promotion research and healthcare research, with a particular focus on healthy ageing. The aim is to develop evidence-based strategies that support health, independence and social participation well into old age. In addition to the treatment of diseases, the primary concern is how prevention, health promotion and appropriate care structures can help to maintain the quality of life and autonomy of older people in the long term.
A key component of the professorship is close collaboration with the Haus der Barmherzigkeit and its Academy for Ageing Research. This collaboration creates important conditions for practice-oriented research, as it facilitates access to diverse populations of older people as well as to routine clinical data. This enables scientific findings to be rapidly translated into clinical practice and allows innovative approaches to prevention, diagnosis and care for older people to be developed and evaluated.
Furthermore, interdisciplinary collaboration is to be further strengthened through networking with clinical and non-university partners, as well as national and international research networks. The aim is to further develop gerontology at MedUni Vienna as an interdisciplinary research focus and to effectively translate scientific findings into healthcare, prevention and health policy.
In teaching too, Dorner will place an emphasis on research-led and interprofessional training. A key component of this is the long-standing collaboration with the Haus der Barmherzigkeit as part of the ‘Social Competence’ module in the first semester of the core curriculum. Alongside gerontological content, the focus here is on students’ first-hand experience of interacting with people who are chronically ill or in need of care. Furthermore, geriatric and gerontological topics are to be more firmly embedded as cross-cutting subjects throughout the entire medical degree programme.
Existing teaching programmes, such as the lecture series ‘Geriatrics and Gerontology’ and the ‘Running Team’ – a teaching format that combines academic content with group running sessions – are to be further expanded. The aim is to introduce students to current research on healthy ageing at an early stage, whilst at the same time raising their awareness of health-promoting lifestyles.
About the person
Thomas E. Dorner is Head of the Academy for Ageing Research and of the Department of Research and Teaching at Haus der Barmherzigkeit. He also heads the Karl Landsteiner Institute for Health Promotion Research, which he founded in 2020. At MedUni Vienna, he worked at the Center for Public Health within the Department of Social and Preventive Medicine, initially as an Assistant Professor and later as an Associate Professor. After twelve years as President of the Austrian Society for Public Health, he has been its Honorary President since 2023. His research interests include gerontology, health promotion research, healthcare research, social determinants of health, lifestyle and chronic diseases, as well as determinants of work ability.