The investigation of heat transfer within porous medium has attracted considerable interest because of its growing practical importance. The present paper is devoted to the study of a steady-state non-isothermal fluid flow through a vertical cylindrical annulus filled with sparsely packed porous medium. The governing system is given by the Darcy-Brinkman-Boussinesq model where the heat equation includes the viscous dissipation term. The side walls are maintained at uniform temperatures, while the flow is driven by the axial pressure gradient. Introducing the thickness of the annular region as the small parameter of the problem, the goal is to derive the approximation of the flow via asymptotic analysis. Although the governing problem is coupled and nonlinear, the asymptotic solution is proposed in the explicit form and that represents our main contribution. As such, it clearly displays the effects of porous structure and viscous dissipation on the temperature and velocity distribution. Due to the viscous dissipation, we observe the increase in the heat generation leading to a raise in the temperature and velocity profile within the annulus. Moreover, it is deduced that reducing the thickness of the annular region may be employed to strengthen the seepage velocity of the working fluid.