Hans-Hermann Dickhuth

Hans-Hermann Dickhuth (born 1 September 1947) is a retired university-based German sports doctor. His name hit the headlines in 2011 when allegations surfaced that his 1983 habilitation (post-doctoral academic qualification) had been awarded for a dissertation that reportedly contained extensive word-for-word quotations from the doctoral dissertation of one or more of his own students. The potential news value of otherwise mainstream plagiarism accusations was enhanced by the fact that one of the students subsequently became Dickhuth's wife. Hans-Hermann Dickhuth was born in Braunschweig. Following qualification, in 1978 he became an assistant to Joseph Keul at the Sports Medicine Department at the University of Freiburg. He completed his specialist training in Cardiology at the university. He subsequently headed up the Echocardiography Laboratory at Freiburg where he also worked as a senior clinical physician. In 1989 he transferred to the nearby University of Tübingen where he took charge of the Sports Medicine department. He developed it into a highly successful centre, both clinically and scientifically. After his former boss died in 2000 he returned to Freiburg, taking over in 2001 as Chief Doctor of Sports Medicine at the University Clinic. That same year Dickhuth succeeded Keul as president of the German Society for Sports Medicine ("Deutsche Gesellschaft für Sportmedizin und Prävention" / DGSP), a position he retained till 2006. He also held leadership roles during this period in the International Federation of Sports Medicine ("Fédération Internationale de Médecine du Sport" / FIMS) and the European Federation of Sports Medicine Associations (EFSMA), serving as vice-president of the latter between 2002 and 2012. From 1981 Dickhuth was supervising top German athletes. After receiving a report on "Doping allegations in respect of doctors in the Sports Medicine Department" ("Dopingvorwürfen gegenüber Ärzten der Abteilung Sportmedizin") the University Clinic eventually withdrew from providing this form of care for athletes.