Dr. Wacław Jan Kroczek, DMD, PhD
Tarnowskie Góry, Silesia Voivodeship, Poland; President of the GRG Management Board, Director for GRG Supercentenarian Research and Database Division; also GRG Correspondent for Poland & Nordic Countries E-mail: wjk.grg@gmail.com; Voice: (0048) 600109523
Involved in the GRG study since 2012, Dr. Kroczek held the positions of: GRG Correspondent for Poland and Nordic Countries (since 2013), GRG Admin Assistant (2015-2018), GRG Administrator for Case Validation (2018-2023), Acting Director for GRG Supercentenarian Research and Database Division (2023-2024). He was democratically elected for the position of the President of the GRG Management Board in 2024.
On 2 December 2024, Wacław Jan Kroczek successfully defended his PhD thesis on the geriatric evaluation of the Polish population of semi-supercentenarians and supercentenarians. As a result, on 13 December 2024, the Medical University of Silesia awarded him a PhD in Medical Sciences and Health Sciences. Dr. Kroczek’s pioneering discoveries were built the first doctoral thesis on supercentenarian research in Poland.
Graduated from Medical University of Silesia in 2015 with the DMD degree and began admitting patients in many different dental cliniques in Czeladź and Tarnowskie Góry ever since. In his practice, Dr. Kroczek is profoundly engaged in oral surgery, restorative dentistry, and prosthetics.
Participant of many domestic and foreign scientific conferences. In 2016, he won the first prize in a public health session held at Gdańsk 24th International Student Scientific Conference, for his work “The emergence of supercentenarians in Poland and the study of human longevity”. He participated in conferences organized by the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research in Copenhagen, Denmark (2015) Tallinn, Estonia (2016) Rostock, Germany, (2017) and Paris, France (2019). He proved the existence of the population of supercentenarians (people over 110 years of age) in modern Poland. By 2023, he described 30 such cases. He visited and interviewed twelve of them, including Aleksandra Dranka of Harklowa (1903-2014), Jadwiga Szubartowicz of Lublin (1905-2017) and Tekla Juniewicz of Gliwice (1906-2022), Czesława Łasiewicz of Monki [Pol. Mońki] (1907-2018), Irena Śmialowska of Legionowo (1908-2019), Antonina Partyka of Bojadla [Pol. Bojadła] (1908-2020), Leonarda Ratkiewicz of Krapkowice (1908-2019), Stanisław Kowalski of Swidnica [Pol. Świdnica] (1910-2022), Emilia Borchert of Warsaw (1910-2020), Wanda Szajowska of Kraków (1911-2022) Agnieszka Strzałka of Kolonia Sol [Pol. Kolonia Sól] (1912-2022), Jadwiga Żak-Stewart of Łódź (1912-present), Irena Siła-Nowicka of Warsaw (1913-2023), Anna Gawłowska of Czerwionka-Leszczyny (1913-2024), Helena Michalik (1914-2024) of Kazimierza Wielka. In cooperation with the closest family and through the Consulate General of the Republic of Poland in Lwów, he reached the original birth record of Tekla Juniewicz, proving her status as the oldest Polish woman in modern history and the first who crossed the barrier of 112 and 113 years in Polish history. In 2014-2015, he participated in an international scientific team’s travels to Verbania, Piedmont, Italy, where they met and interviewed several times the oldest living European at the time and the last surviving person in the world born before 1900, Emma Morano (1899-2017). In 2017, he travelled to Sprockhoevel, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, where he twice met and interviewed Mathilde Mange (1906-2019), who later became the first German woman who reached the age of 113. In 2024, he travelled to Romania where he met and interviewed Ilie Ciocan (1913-present).
He lectured at the University of the Third Age. He is a regular columnist for Gazeta Senior, a nationwide magazine devoted to the social issues of the elderly. In 2018 he took part in a competition organized by the MEP Jerzy Buzek “(Un)ordinary women – unusual stories. Silesian women on the 100th anniversary of independence”, in which he brought closer the figure of Stefania Zacharska (1906-2016), a well-deserved teacher from Tarnowskie Góry, who lived to 109 years and was also one of the oldest Polish women. Based on his experience, he hypothesized that the secret to longevity, which supercentenarians state independently of each other, is, among others, the resistance to stress, optimism, strong family ties and Scandinavian moderation, the golden mean.
Wacław Jan Kroczek also cooperated with Guinness World Records to validate of two candidates for the title of World’s Oldest Man from Poland: Alexander Imich of New York, USA (1903-2014) and Israel Kristal of Haifa, Israel (1903-2017). Due to the discovery of sufficiently strong evidence from the archives that meet modern age validation standards, compiled in the monograph “Supercentenarians” by the Belgian demographer Dr. Michel Poulain, the Guinness World Records officially recognized both (Alexander Imich in 2014, Israel Kristal in 2016) as the oldest living men in the world in their time. He appeared many times in various domestic and foreign media in connection with important events and reports from the niche of longevity.
On Dec. 10, 2020, there was published the new monograph by Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research entitled “Exceptional Lifespans”, for which Kroczek authored and/or co-authored three chapters: Centenarians, Semi-supercentenarians and the Emergence of Supercentenarians in Poland, Validation of 113-Year Old Israel Kristal as the World’s Oldest Man, Age 115+ in the USA: An Update.
On Apr. 14, 2021, he visited Stanislaw Kowalski on his 111th birthday, the first man in Poland who turned 110 years of age, becoming the first male supercentenarian in Poland. On June 10, 2022, he visited Tekla Juniewicz on her 116th birthday – the first validated 116-year old supercentenarian living north to the 50th parallel.
In 2022, Wacław Jan Kroczek was the leader of the tech team responsible for the developement of the new modern GRG website and technology under the link: www.grg-supercentenarians-org.
On January 23, 2023, Wacław Jan Kroczek founded the World Supercentenarian Forum, a new community intended to be welcoming and inclusive place for discussions on healthy senility, human longevity and the world’s oldest people, while respecting the scientific integrity, ethics, and principles.
On January 30, 2023, he travelled to Łódź, Łódź Voivodeship, where he met and interviewed supercentenarian Jadwiga Żak-Stewart. He would later re-visit her on her 111th birthday.
On February 27, 2023, he met and interviewed Colonel Kazimierz Klimczak, who was then the oldest living man in Poland and the oldest living 1939 September campaign veteran, as well as the oldest living 1944 Warsaw Uprising veteran.
On March 12, 2023, he met and interviewed Irena Sila-Nowicka who is wife of the late Wladyslaw Sila-Nowicki, a notable figure for Poland’s 20th century.
On June 6, 2023, he participated in Anna Gawłowska‘s 110th birthday, recognizing her in the name of the GRG as the second supercentenarian in the history of Silesia Voivodeship.
On Aug. 15, 2023, he has taken the role of the GRG Correspondent for the Nordic Countries (including Denmark, its autonomous regions: Faroe Islands and Greenland, Sweden, and Norway).
