Professor of Anaesthesiology and Intensive Care Medicine at Kiel University until 2009 and CEO of the UKSH since 2009. Executive MBA at the University of St. Gallen. Chairman of the VUD since 2021. Member of the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina since 2006 and Senator of the Section for Surgery, Orthopaedics and Anaesthesiology since 2024. In 2022, he was awarded honorary doctorates from the University of Belgrade (Serbia) and the National Medical Universities of Kiev and Lviv (Ukraine) for his services to anaesthesiology and the organisation of university medicine, as well as for his humanitarian work. In 2024, he was awarded the Order of St Panteleimon (Ukraine).