It’s been an inspiring, record-breaking year for PCR Courses!

This time last year the interventional cardiovascular community was celebrating getting back together in person for the first time in two years. The unique blended format of EuroPCR 2022 gathered an incredible 11,000 participants. There were several other reasons for celebration during the Course too, including several anniversaries for PCRonline and PCR Publishing. As for the Andreas Grüntzig Ethica Award for nurses and allied professionals all around the globe, it was in well-deserved recognition of their hard work, skill and dedication to patient care – during their routine daily practice, and in times of deep crisis.

The official Course of APSIC also saw the return of an onsite gathering. As the Asia Pacific region was still deeply affected by the pandemic, AICT-AsiaPCR 2022 offered a large-scale digital package as well, so that participants could join online. The Guest of Honour was the renowned pioneer in interventional cardiology and founder of PCR, Professor Jean Marco. He shared a thought-provoking talk that encouraged healthcare practitioners to “place their self-reflection on information at the centre of their learning process.” He also called to mind the key goal of improving professional proficiency: “To select and apply the most appropriate and economically sustainable management or technical strategy for each individual patient presenting with a specific clinical situation.”

As you may know, perfection often comes in threes at PCR London Valves! Last November the 3-day Heart Team Course gathered over 3,500 onsite and online participants who were looking to keep up to date with all the very latest on the three valves: aortic, mitral and tricuspid. Interventional cardiologists, cardiac surgeons, imagers and their surrounding teams took advantage of innovative session formats and 3-step Simulation Lab learning pathways in which to observe, practise and train. For the first time, 70 participants gathered at a highly interactive PCR London Valves Fellows TAVI Course held the day before the main event, and five ‘PCR Live from London’ news programmes shared regular insightful summaries of what was happening at the venue.

Every December since 2010, the leading-edge interventional Course in the Middle East has been drawing an increasing number of practitioners from the Gulf region and beyond. The latest edition attained new heights, reaching a record total of 1,111 participants, of which 1,051 were onsite in Dubai! An inspiring session by GulfWIN (Women in Intervention) shone a light on the status of female interventionalists in the region, and presented the group’s main goals: to educate, encourage and empower more young women to pursue the field; and to create more research opportunities in order to provide better healthcare services to the region’s female patients.

There was a series of six dedicated live webinars last year that went on from September 2022 to December 2022, but in February 2023, it was the return of an in-person #PCRtokyo after three years of absence. The community was definitely in the starting blocks to get back together in person to learn, train and network with their peers! A record-breaking total of 1,108 enthusiastic participants joined a 3-day Course that exceeded expectations. They were able to benefit from the reignition of the popular Imaging Day and Stroke Prevention Day that were originally initiated a few years ago. The Training Village and the eight workshops in the new Echo and CT Hands-on Lab also met with great success among those eager to brush up on their practical skills.

In 2022, AfricaPCR took the form of 4 live webinars on hot topics. Following a comprehensive needs analysis across the continent, Board Members tailored the subsequent extremely practical 2023 Scientific Programme to meet the educational needs of practitioners in different African regions, including those with little or no access to technologies, or hundreds of kilometres from the nearest cardiac centre. A total of over 500 onsite and online participants represented all those involved in patients’ journeys: general practitioners, nurses and allied professionals, interventional cardiologists, cardiac surgeons and surrounding teams. With the additional collaboration of two hubs joining in real time from Sudan and Egypt, the continental Course crossed more borders than ever before.