Professor Maria Fiatarone Singh

Professor Fiatarone Singh is the John Sutton Chair of Exercise and Sport Science in the School of Exercise & Sport Science of The University of Sydney, Australia.

Professor Maria Fiatarone Singh is a geriatrician whose research, clinical, and teaching career has focused on the integration of geriatric medicine, exercise physiology, and nutrition as a means to improve quality of life for the aged. She has designed and carried out many clinical trials involving frail elders, including several large multi-center studies. She is a Fellow of the Gerontological Society of America, Board Certified in Internal Medicine and Geriatric Medicine, a Fellow of the Royal Australasian College of Physicians, and a member of the American Geriatrics Society, the American College of Sports Medicine, and the Australasian Society for Geriatric Medicine. She has edited one book, authored over 65 peer reviewed journal articles, 45 book chapters and reviews, 68 abstracts, numerous lay publications, and publishes a quarterly newsletter for health professions and a series of fact sheets on exercise and geriatric health problems, in addition to her scientific articles in peer-reviewed journals.

She has developed a multi-media accredited curriculum for physicians and other health care professionals for the implementation and management of fitness programs for geriatric patients in long term care settings, which have now been translated into Japanese, German, French, and Spanish for use internationally. She has lectured widely including invited presentations in Japan, Europe, North America, Scandinavia, and Australia, and has conducted and consulted on clinical and basic science research projects in Canada, America, Germany, Great Britain, and Australia.

She has served on many national policy boards, including the Fellowship Curriculum Guidelines Committee of the American Geriatrics Society, the Consensus Panel for the Position Stand on Physical Activity in the Older Adult of the American College of Sport Medicine, the Governor's Council on Physical Fitness, Department of Public Health, and Department of Elder Affairs within the state of Massachusetts, the expert review panel for the US Surgeon General's Report on Physical Activity in Americans, and the National Institute on Aging Expert Committee to develop education materials for the promotion of physical activity in older Americans, among others. She has mentored undergraduate, graduate, post-graduate, and mid-career scientists and physicians from Canada, Central and South America, Europe, China, New Zealand, and Australia, as well as the US, including those from medical, nursing, physiology, nutrition, and therapy backgrounds. She serves on the Advisory Board of the Keiser Institute on Aging and is a member of the Editorial Board of the Journal of Gerontology, as well as being a reviewer for many of the major internal medicine, physiology, exercise, gerontology, and nutrition journals.

She has worked with industry to develop a chain of health clubs for seniors in the US (WellBridge), wellness programs for travellers (Novotel Hotels/Harvard University and the National Touring Association) and modified resistance and aerobic training equipment (Keiser and NuStep Corporations). She is a recipient of the Edward Henderson Award for outstanding medical students in gerontology and the New Investigator Award, both from the American Geriatrics Society, The USDA Scientist of the Year in 1995, the Brookdale Foundation National Fellowship Award, and the Herbert de Vries Award for Excellence in contributions to exercise and aging, among others.

She is the founder and executive director of the non-profit Fit For Your Life Foundation, Ltd., whose mission is to foster the highest possible physical and mental health and quality of life in older adults, via the conduct of basic and applied research, education of health care professionals and individuals, and dissemination of exercise programs and training materials. This work has included the implementation of fitness programs and training procedures for seniors in many settings including home care, nursing home, acute hospital, outpatient clinics, health maintenance, organizations, retirement communities, psychiatric hospitals, and senior citizen centers in many different countries.

A full Curriculum Vitae is available, together with a summary of Professor Fiatarone Singh's research interests.