The Academic Centre for Healthy Ageing (ACHA) at Queen Mary University of London and Leiden University Medical Centre (LUMC) have established a formal international partnership in healthy ageing, underpinned by a shared commitment to advancing research, education, and innovation to improve outcomes for older people.
This partnership reflects a shared commitment to advancing research, education, and innovation in healthy ageing across the UK and the Netherlands.
This collaboration brings together complementary expertise in clinical care, academic research, and health system innovation across the United Kingdom and the Netherlands. It is grounded in a joint ambition to strengthen integrated approaches to ageing and to translate evidence into meaningful improvements in care for older populations.
The inaugural conference was both a celebration of progress and a renewed sense of momentum for the work ahead in healthy ageing research and care
A key milestone in the partnership was the inaugural International Healthy Ageing Conference, hosted by ACHA in collaboration with the LUMC Centre for Geriatric Medicine (LUMC Centrum voor Ouderengeneeskunde) and SOOL – the Specialisme Ouderengeneeskunde Opleiding at LUMC, whose trainees and faculty played a central role in enabling the symposium and shaping its programme. The event brought together clinicians, researchers, and educators from both institutions to share advances in frailty, complex care, and system-level approaches to supporting ageing populations. It also included the inaugural lectures of Professor Adam Gordon and Professor Elizabeth Sampson, marking significant academic milestones within the partnership.
The exchange programme creates a unique opportunity for shared learning between health systems facing similar challenges in ageing populations
Building on this foundation, ACHA and LUMC, in collaboration with SOOL, are developing an international exchange programme to support shared learning between health systems facing similar demographic challenges. The programme will enable clinicians and trainees to engage with multidisciplinary models of care across settings in North East London and the Netherlands, with a focus on integrated care for older people.
Together, these initiatives reflect a formal and enduring partnership committed to strengthening research, education, and workforce development in healthy ageing, and to fostering long-term collaboration between two leading European centres.
