The ASPEN Board of Directors is pleased to announce that it has bestowed the 2026 ASPEN Lifetime Achievement Award upon Gordon Lee Jensen, MD, PhD, FASPEN.
Dr. Jensen is being honored for his unending commitment and significant contributions as a researcher, practitioner, and leader who has advanced parenteral and enteral nutrition, as well as his continuous service to ASPEN. His efforts have challenged long-established approaches to characterizing malnutrition and have promoted a new appreciation for the interplay of malnutrition, inflammation, and disease. He will receive the Lifetime Achievement Award on February 14, 2026, at the ASPEN Nutrition Science & Practice Conference in Long Beach, California.
Dr. Jensen is the senior associate dean for research emeritus and professor of medicine and nutrition emeritus at the Larner College of Medicine, University of Vermont, in Burlington, Vermont.
There hasn’t been a time in Dr. Jensen’s career when he hasn’t been dedicated to advancing clinical nutrition. After earning a BS in Biology from Pennsylvania State University and an MS in Zoology from the University of New Hampshire, he earned a PhD in Nutritional Biochemistry from Cornell University in 1981, followed by an MD from Cornell University Medical College in 1984.
He completed his residency in internal medicine and a fellowship in clinical nutrition at the New England Deaconess Hospital—a major teaching hospital of Harvard Medical School—where he was mentored by George L. Blackburn, MD, PhD, ASPEN’s second president, and Bruce R. Bistrain, MD, PhD, ASPEN’s 13th president.
Within months of completing his fellowship, Dr. Jensen was invited to speak at an ASPEN meeting in Florida in 1989. He wasn’t content with simply joining ASPEN; he immediately went to work expanding its reach by forming the Central Pennsylvania ASPEN Chapter.
After completing fellowship training, Dr. Jensen led the nutrition support programs at Geisinger Healthcare System. In 1998, he joined the faculty of the Division of Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Nutrition at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. He also served as director of the Vanderbilt Center for Human Nutrition and was a core investigator at the Nashville VA Medical Center’s Geriatric Research Education Clinical Center.
In 2007, Dr. Jensen was named professor and head of the Department of Nutritional Sciences at Penn State University, along with an appointment as professor of medicine at Penn State College of Medicine. In 2016, Dr. Jensen was named senior associate dean of research at the University of Vermont (UVM) Larner College of Medicine. He also assumed a parallel appointment as director of research for UVM’s expansive Health Network, which serves more than one million residents.
His wide-ranging administrative responsibilities did not keep Dr. Jensen from continuing his research on the nutritional concerns of older persons and conducting a weekly clinic for adult malnourished patients.
The author of more than 225 journal articles, reviews, and book chapters, Dr. Jensen was honored with several prestigious memberships. He was elected an honorary member of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, received an honorary membership in the European Society for Clinical Nutrition and Metabolism, and was named an ASPEN fellow in 2011, the inaugural year of the award. He is also a fellow of the American Society for Nutrition.
Over the past 35 years, Dr. Jensen has served on and chaired a long list of ASPEN committees, including nine years on the JPEN Editorial Board. His leadership was recognized and called upon in 2005 when he was elected ASPEN’s 29th president.
“It is very fitting that a change in ASPEN’s program year in 2005 extended Dr. Jensen’s term in office to 18 months, making him the longest-standing president in the history of our society,” recalls Vincent W. Vanek, MD, FACS, FASPEN. “His steadfast leadership came at the right time.”
“It is hard to quantify the many ways ASPEN has benefitted from Dr. Jensen’s passionate and analytical approach to clinical nutrition. His intellectual analysis is inspiring, and his enthusiasm is contagious,” said ASPEN President Kathleen Gura, PharmD, BCNSP, FASHP, FPPA, FASPEN, FMSHP.
Dr. Jensen’s provocative presidential address, “Inflammation as the Key Interface of the Medical and Nutrition Universes,” and his 2014 Jonathan E. Rhoads Lecture, “Malnutrition and Inflammation: Where Have We Been? Where Are We Now? Where Are We Going?” are but two examples of the impact of his focus on advancing clinical nutrition.
Although officially “semi-retired” since 2022, there is little evidence that Dr. Jensen has changed his level of work on clinical nutrition.
“Dr. Jensen has been one of the most active and persuasive proponents of ASPEN’s Global Leadership Initiative on Malnutrition,” said Rhoads Research Foundation President Charlene Compher, PhD, RD, LDN, FASPEN. “Through numerous collaborations, presentations, interviews, and journal articles, he is advancing our ability to share data, evaluate targeted interventions, and monitor outcomes. He has guided our vision toward a modern understanding of disease-related malnutrition, shaping the field for future innovation and improved patient care.”
As the keynote speaker at the ASPEN 2025 Nutrition Science & Practice Conference, Dr. Jensen urged others to take on the challenges and opportunities in clinical nutrition. He has truly dedicated his life to demonstrating how it’s done.