EAPCI 2022-2024
Emanuele Barbato, MD, PhD, EAPCI Past President
The theme of the 2022-2024 EAPCI Presidency was EAPCI 4.0 – Equitable Access to Percutaneous Cardiovascular Interventions 4 Patients and Professionals. There were three strategic drivers for professionals: to foster equitable access to education and training, to reduce the gender gap in interventional cardiology practice, and to promote more contemporary and uniform quality standards in catheterisation laboratories. For patients, the key strategic drivers were to improve access to percutaneous cardiovascular interventions, to facilitate a more rapid adoption of innovative percutaneous therapies, and to raise awareness of percutaneous cardiovascular interventions amongst the general population.
Over the course of the presidency, major changes occurred in the EAPCI membership structure to bring the EAPCI in line with other ESC associations. Since the launch of the EAPCI Membership at PCR London Valves 2023, over 1,000 EAPCI members have joined the new programme, a quarter of whom are new members to EAPCI. Furthermore, during this term we renewed our strategic partnership with PCR and Europa Group. This agreement brings together the strengths of all groups, uniting members and national societies to provide high quality educational resources and scientific research. With the renewal of this partnership, EuroIntervention remains the official journal of the EAPCI, and EuroPCR and PCR London Valves the official EAPCI courses.
The work of any presidency requires the support of many, and this presidency benefited from the dedication, knowledge and skills of the executive board: EAPCI Past President Darius Dudek, President-Elect Alaide Chieffo, Secretary Robert Byrne, Treasurer Louise Buchanan and PCR representatives Martine Gilard and Vijay Kunadian. Their commitment, along with the commitment of the Chairs, Co-Chairs and Committee members, has allowed the EAPCI to provide the best possible resources for the EAPCI community and work towards the EAPCI mission ‘to reduce the burden of cardiovascular disease through percutaneous interventions’.
Providing education and guidance to members remained a central role of the association throughout the presidency. The 2024 EAPCI Core Curriculum for Percutaneous Valvular and Structural Heart Disease Interventions has been developed by the EAPCI Training and Certification Committee in collaboration with national societies and working groups through the EAPCI International Affairs Committee and will provide a key reference for promoting uniformity in training and education across EAPCI countries. The EAPCI Scientific Documents and Initiatives Committee have redeveloped the standard operating procedures for the submission and review of documents, streamlining the process, which has led to an extremely productive time in terms of the publication of EAPCI scientific documents. These documents are very well received by the EAPCI community: they provide guidance for the clinical management of topics not covered in ESC Clinical Practice Guidelines, and they explore expert consensus in a structured way that typically includes very practical advice for daily management of these topics.
The Nurses and Allied Professionals (NAPs) Committee developed and launched their new online EAPCI NAPs Course. The aim of this self-paced 9-module course is to deliver a standardised educational programme for all NAPs working in a cath lab which provides the knowledge required to work at a higher level in the cath lab setting.
The EAPCI-PCR Fellows Course, which celebrated its 10-year anniversary this year, remains a key date within the calendar. The Fellows Course is dedicated to early career interventional cardiologists with a full-day programme focusing on the fundamentals of our field through case-based learning.
The launch of the EAPCI Journal Club has allowed interventional cardiology fellows from around the world to engage with experts in the field to provide critical analysis of the most recent papers. The first six episodes have been very well received and I look forward to its ongoing success.
Returning to work after a period of illness or maternity leave can be challenging, so the EAPCI Gender and Disparities Committee developed the EAPCI online coaching programme, which is designed to offer practical, research, and personal development guidance to help participants successfully reintegrate into their clinical roles after a period of absence due to sick leave or maternity.
EAPCI fellowships are a unique opportunity for members to train with and learn from world-renowned experts as well as develop a network in prestigious European centres. In the current economic climate, obtaining collaboration from industry to provide this grant support is challenging. It is a credit to the EAPCI Fellowship Grant Committee that, despite this, they awarded 14 grants in 2023 and 15 in 2024, with half the grants awarded to men and half to women.
The past two years have been a busy period with a time of significant developments and growth within the EAPCI. Many of the projects commenced during this presidency will continue to develop and flourish within the next term. I would like to take this opportunity to thank all the many members of the EAPCI whose dedication to the association has made this term so productive and will no doubt continue to contribute to our association. Finally, I wish our new President the very best with her term and look forward to continuing to support the EAPCI.
EAPCI 2024-2026
Alaide Chieffo, MD, EAPCI President
I am taking over as EAPCI President from Emanuele Barbato, who has led the EAPCI to new levels throughout his term from 2022-2024. Working with the 2022-2024 EAPCI Board in my role as President-Elect has given me significant insights into the working of our organisation and the commitment and dedication of all EAPCI members and collaborators. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Emanuele for his commitment and work for the community and look forward to ongoing collaboration as we move from EAPCI President and President-Elect to Past President and President.
The renewal of the strategic agreement with Europa Group under Emanuele Barbato’s term allowed us to move forward in our commitment to provide educational and scientific resources to the EAPCI community with the EuroPCR and PCR London Valve courses and EuroIntervention journal.
As an association of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC), we benefit from the unique structure of the largest cardiovascular society worldwide. The ESC launched their new ESC Strategic Plan 2023-2028, and under these auspices we develop our strategies for each presidency.
The theme of the 2024-2026 EAPCI Presidency is #RISEANDLIFT with the three key strategic drivers of inclusivity, transparency and meritocracy. Within this presidency I aim to broaden participation and engagement within the EAPCI, promoting a tight collaboration with the different ESC associations and Working Groups. The EAPCI comprises members of 57 national societies and working groups. National societies are already represented in the EAPCI National Societies Committee by the President or representative of the society. During the 2024-2026 term I wish to increase the diversity of membership amongst all committees, not just the National Societies Committee. In this regard we launched the EAPCI open call for committee members on the 7 May 2024, promoted via social media, the EAPCI newsletter and bulletin, communications to national societies as well as at EuroPCR. The call for members was extremely successful with members from 47 countries applying for roles within the new committees.
Education and development will continue to play a key role in the association and will be a specific focus of my presidency. With almost half of our members under 40 years of age and one-quarter in training, we will continue to further develop dedicated educational and training opportunities for these members. Importantly, we will continue to develop the EAPCI certification, working in close collaboration with national societies. In line with this, the EAPCI Young Committee was the most popular committee during the open call. The number of high-quality candidates applying for committee positions leads to many challenging discussions with regard to how to best integrate EAPCI members into the association, utilising their skills and knowledge base and supporting them to be the future leaders of tomorrow.
The previous Board was extremely productive in providing EAPCI fellowship grants supporting early-career members. We will continue to work with our partners, aiming to further increase the numbers of grants available. The work of NAPs colleagues remains key, and I will work with them to build upon their recently launched educational programme. I recognise that there are many areas of our community that are underserved in terms of educational resources, and we plan to develop education modules which will be available online, onsite and in hybrid versions to target the needs of these communities.
Finally, though EAPCI is a European association, a quarter of our members come from non-European countries. Throughout my presidency I aim to leverage the knowledge and skills of these members in order to increase the global impact of the EAPCI and our international collaborations, to promote networking and intersocietal collaboration with ESC Affiliated Cardiac Societies, which will allow us to share experiences with colleagues from all over the world. In addition, collaboration within different medical disciplines will be increased in order to reflect the multidisciplinary approach in our everyday practice. The previous presidency was extremely productive in terms of scientific documents and joint sessions with ESC National and Affiliated Cardiac Societies as well as with other associations and societies. We will build on this foundation, cementing current collaborations and developing new collaborations, in order to remain a key leader in producing high-quality scientific statements and consensus documents as well as educational content that meets the needs of our community. Joint sessions at congresses remain a key driver in developing both professional and personal relationships between societies and members and provide a key link between the EAPCI, its members and collaborators.
I am taking over as EAPCI President in a very exciting time: the EAPCI is in a strong position with well-developed foundations, and I am delighted to be joined by President-Elect Martine Gilard. The upcoming EAPCI Board and committee members are an extremely dedicated group of people, with a diverse mix of prior and new members identified during the recent open call. I extend a warm welcome and my thanks to them for their commitment and dedication to the association. Throughout my presidency, I look forward to working in close collaboration with all members of the EAPCI and encourage everyone to become active participants in the association.
