PCR Fellowship Programmes: A new international stepping stone in PCR’s educational universe

These comprehensive 1- to 12-month fellowship programmes complement PCR’s already extensive educational ecosystem, which notably includes PCR Courses, PCR Seminars, PCR Webinars, Certifications and PCR Scientific Publications such as The PCR Textbook and EuroIntervention. PCR Fellowship Programmes are tailored for the 5,000+ fellows in the PCR community, many of whom have already taken part in annual 1-day PCR initiatives tailored for their educational needs. For example, the PCR Fellows Course held the day before EuroPCR has gathered 200 participants per edition for over 12 years, while up to 150 have joined the more recent PCR Fundamentals Course at PCR London Valves in the last 3 years. PCR Fellows Courses during AICT-AsiaPCR in Singapore have counted up to 200 attendees for 3 years; during ISICAM 2024 and 2025 in Jakarta they rallied 200 attendees; and the first edition to be held at GulfPCR-GIM in Dubai this year is likely to meet with equal success.

Martine Gilard is an enthusiastic chair of the dedicated Task Force behind the new PCR Fellowship Programmes, alongside Flavio Ribichini, Gabor G. Toth and Mirjam Wild. Delighted to have the opportunity to develop this fresh initiative, she says:

She also highlights how PCR has the know-how and is providing the means to ensure that these fellowships are set up smoothly and to everyone’s benefit. Describing the three types of PCR Fellowship Programmes, open to all nationalities, Martine Gilard explains:

Standard clinical fellowship – Up to 1 year in the host centre:

“This is a hands-on training programme where participants actively engage in real-world tasks within a professional setting, to build applied skills. It’s tailored more for those at an early stage of their career and the age limit is 40 years old to cater for the countries where becoming an interventionalist takes time.”

Standard research fellowship – Up to 1 year in the host centre:

“There is no age limit for this advanced graduate or postdoctoral training in an area of academic scholarship. In some countries, you need to have research in order to become a professor, so interventionalists can use this opportunity to work full-time on research and publishing. It’s a win-win system for both the centre and the fellow.”

Observational micro-fellowship – Up to 3 months:

“PCR has initiated this new concept of fellowships, where no age limit applies. It’s a learning experience where participants primarily observe experts in action to gain insights into a technique or procedure that is not practised in their own centre, for example, CTO. It’s a fantastic way for the fellow and for the home centres to elevate their skills, and is very easy to set up.”

This year’s pilot phase will be in collaboration with European centres, but subsequent ‘Calls for applications’ will promote fellowships literally worldwide. Martine Gilard is looking forward to deploying the fellowships on an international scale and enabling fellows to gain experience in a different healthcare system alongside colleagues of different cultural background. She explains however, that “some fellows will not necessarily have to travel abroad for their programme. For example, in some countries such as Argentina, you find small centres as well as huge high-level centres. Practitioners in the smaller ones can benefit immensely from a structured fellowship organised in one of the country’s larger centres.”

She goes on to underline that the selected host centres will always be of renowned expertise in the required field or procedure. They must meet the Task Force’s long list of clearly defined quality criteria and be able to host fellows whilst providing them with a high standard of focused interventional training by experienced operators. “Thanks to PCR’s institutional reputation and longstanding global connections, it’s not so difficult to find volunteer centres that are keen to deliver education, but they have to tick absolutely all of the boxes.”

What are the other advantages for practitioners who join a PCR Fellowship Programme? For Martine Gilard, over and above admission to PCR Courses and subscriptions to the PCR Textbook and EuroIntervention, it is without a doubt the access it gives to a long-lasting alumni network in the PCR universe. “A network within the network… It opens up doors and provides opportunities to take on key roles in PCR activities, become a future KOL and actively contribute to advancing better patient care worldwide.”

The goal of PCR Fellowship Programmes is to tailor format and content to identified educational needs and target audiences, such as a particular specialty or world region. When asked to share an example, Martine Gilard was thrilled to speak of WAVE – Women in AV valves – a 6-month international PCR Mentorship Programme directed by Marta Sitges and Mirjam Wild, with support from the PCR Mitral and Tricuspid Focus Groups. “It is addressing the under-representation of women in structural heart disease, particularly in mitral and tricuspid valve interventions – combining mentorship, structured education and clinical exposure. All of the mentors and fellows are women.

It’s transformative education… a tangible way to increase the number of women experts in this field. We need to begin somewhere because in France for example, we have 1,100 interventional cardiologists, and only 75 of these are women.”

Martine Gilard describes her own fellowship back in 2001, fairly late in her career, in the department of Augusto Pichard at the Washington Hospital Centre.

PCR Fellowship programmes