New CIRSE President Prof. Stefan Müller-Hülsbeck shares his strategic vision for strengthening IR’s clinical role, expanding access to training, and supporting the next generation. Prof. Müller-Hülsbeck will lead the CIRSE Executive Committee through September 2028.
What does becoming CIRSE President mean to you? Which experiences in your career have prepared you for the role?
Müller-Hülsbeck: Becoming CIRSE President is both an immense honour and a profound professional responsibility. It represents an opportunity to serve a global community that has fundamentally shaped my career. My transition from cardiac and vascular surgery to interventional radiology gave me a unique, cross-disciplinary perspective on vascular and minimally invasive patient care.
Years of leading an academic department with a strong IR focus, directing clinical trials, and actively serving within CIRSE committees have prepared me for the strategic, educational, and political demands of this role. Crucially, this journey was propelled by the generous mentorship and encouragement of senior CIRSE leaders who instilled in me the value of international collaboration, clinical rigor, and continuous innovation.
What drew you toward IR after your original start in cardiac and vascular surgery? What possibilities did you see in the specialty at that time?
Müller-Hülsbeck: During my early years in cardiac and vascular surgery, I was fascinated by vascular anatomy and invasive intraoperative “intervention”, but I quickly realized that the future of vascular lay in image-guided, ultra-minimally invasive therapies.
Interventional radiology offered an unprecedented fusion of advanced imaging, precision treatment of the target, and immediate clinical impact with significantly lower patient recovery times and morbidity rates. I saw a rapidly expanding horizon—a specialty capable of transforming major surgical procedures into short-stay interventions or even on an outpatient basis across peripheral vascular disease.
CIRSE has placed growing emphasis on IRs’ involvement in the full course of patient care. Where do you see the opportunities to strengthen the clinical role of IRs?
Müller-Hülsbeck: The transition from a purely technical service provider to a primary clinical discipline is essential for the survival and growth of IR. Dedicated outpatient clinics with longitudinal follow-up are a natural starting point, as independent IR clinics can handle consultation, workup, and post-procedural surveillance in peripheral arterial disease, embolization therapies, and interventional oncology. Securing primary admitting rights or dedicated IR beds would go a step further, allowing us to manage pre- and post-procedural care directly.
IRs must also take the lead in the room where decisions are made. By chairing tumour boards, vascular conferences, and pain panels, we establish IR as an indispensable clinical decision-maker rather than just an operator.
Looking ahead to part three of the CIRSE Vision for the Future of IR, “Training and excellence”, what questions do you think are important for CIRSE to address about IR’s place within radiology and the wider healthcare system?
Müller-Hülsbeck: We must address fundamental structural questions such as:
– (Sub)Specialty identity and training autonomy: How do we establish standardized, direct-entry or early-(sub)specialization IR training pathways across Europe that balance diagnostic core competence with intensive IR procedural and clinical patient management?
– Integration vs. independence: How can IR maintain its synergy with diagnostic radiology while asserting the clinical autonomy required to compete on equal footing with surgical and angiology/cardiology subspecialties?
– Healthcare value and economics: How can CIRSE equip national societies to demonstrate to healthcare economists and policymakers that primary clinical IR reduces overall hospital stays, complication rates, and long-term treatment costs?
How can CIRSE work with national societies to improve access to IR training and treatments in regions where services are still limited?
Müller-Hülsbeck: CIRSE must act as a global catalyst for equity in image-guided therapy. Working hand in hand with national societies, we can harmonize training guidelines through a standardized European curriculum and support formal recognition of IR as an independent specialty or subspecialty by local health authorities.
Targeted twinning and fellowship programmes, such as the Access to Care Initiative, offer another powerful lever. Expanding hands-on observerships, traveling fellowships, and simulator-based workshops would give young physicians from underserved regions direct access to the training they need. Digital tools can then help close the remaining gap, since high-yield webinars, virtual procedural simulation, and remote multidisciplinary case discussions bring education to places that physical programmes cannot reach.
What support do you think the next generation of IRs needs most, and how would you like CIRSE to provide it?
Müller-Hülsbeck: Through CIRSE’s student programme “Be inspIRed…” and during residency, especially in radiology, we must sharpen what IR stands for, meaning pragmatically delivering the key role of IR: to open the vessel, stop the bleeding, treat the pain, and beat the cancer. While doing that, the next generation needs procedural confidence, clinical mentorship, and career sustainability to fulfil the expectations. Procedural confidence comes from practice, so CIRSE should further expand ESIR courses, including high-fidelity simulator courses, animal lab trainings, and specialized masterclasses covering complex revascularization, elective and emergency embolization, ablation, and pain management procedures.
Young IRs also need the room to develop clinically and as researchers, and CIRSE can help provide structured advocacy tools that support negotiations with hospital leadership for dedicated clinic hours, protected research time, and fairly balanced call schedules. Beyond training and time, they need people to learn from, which is why CIRSE should support structured mentorship programmes that connect early-career interventionalists with international experts for career guidance, research collaboration, and leadership development.
What do you hope to achieve during your presidency?
Müller-Hülsbeck: My primary goals are fourfold. First, I want to accelerate the adoption of clinical IR by systematically supporting European centres in establishing longitudinal clinical care models, outpatient clinics, and primary admitting capabilities. Second, I want to standardize and expand IR education: for individual IRs, I aim to strengthen the European Curriculum (EBIR, EBIR-ES, and EBIR-IO) and work toward establishing further specialist certifications. For IR centres, I will promote IASIOS accreditation to elevate standards of practice and training across all member nations.
Third, I want to promote innovation and high-level evidence by driving registries and prospective clinical research, particularly in endovascular therapies and interventional oncology, to solidify IR’s place in international clinical guidelines. Fourth, I want to foster diversity and next-generation leadership by actively promoting allyship, gender equity, and leadership opportunities for young interventionalists within CIRSE committees and scientific programmes.
