Wilco Achterberg is professor of institutional care and elderly care medicine at Leiden University Medical Center. He is also an elderly care physician and medical director of Topaz (Leiden), and visiting professor at Bergen University (Norway).

More information about Wilco Achterberg

Wilco Achterberg is professor of institutional care and elderly care medicine at Leiden University Medical Center. He is also an elderly care physician and medical director of Topaz (Leiden), and visiting professor at Bergen University (Norway). 

Elderly care medicine

Elderly care medicine (formerly known as nursing home medicine) is a officially recognized medical specialty, with an officially recognized 3 year training program since 1989. It is an answer to demographic changes that lead to much more older people, also much more older people with complex medical problems. Leiden University Medical Center is one of the 3 centers that are officially recognized as elderly care medicine training center. The research program has 3 themes: quality of life in dementia, geriatric rehabilitation and palliative care in a vulnerable brain. Many research projects are initiated, financed and performed together with 10 large nursing home organizations in the region, the UNC-ZH. 

Academic career

After being registered as a nursing home physician in 1996, I started doing research next to my work as a physician in a nursing home. In 2004 I did my PhD thesis, ‘Caring for Quality: the use of the Minimum Data Set for quality improvement in patient care and research’. In 2010 I was appointed the chair of elderly care medicine, which I celebrated in 2011 with my lecture: Connecting in elderly care medicine.

Publications