Born on 24 August 1930, Wagner earned his medical degree at the University of Copenhagen in 1958, after which he completed a doctorate at the Institute for Advanced Study of Human Sexuality, and took an internship at the Trinity Lutheran Hospital in Kansas City, Missouri, United States, followed by a research position at Rockefeller University.
Upon Wagner's return to Denmark, he sought further training in gynecology and obstetrics, and joined the Department of Physiology at the University of Copenhagen as a research assistant in 1964, where he was later named an associate professor.
[1][2] In 1978, Wagner and Adrian Zorgniotti founded the International Society for Impotence Research.
Later Wagner founded the European Society for Impotence Research, which became a regional affiliate of the ISIR.
He was a founding co-editor of the International Journal of Impotence Research, alongside Bill Furlow, from 1989 to 2002.