SocietyEU projectsSHERPA

SHERPA

SHERPA (Smart Human-centred Effortless support for Professional clinical Applications) is a research and innovation project funded by the EU Innovative Health Initiative (IHI) for the duration of January 2025 to December 2028. The project brings together 16 partners from seven EU countries to work on the development and implementation of AI-supported assistive technologies and robotics in interventional radiology, with a specific focus on interventional oncology and neurovascular procedures.

SHERPA aims to support clinicians with intelligent, human-centred digital tools across the entire clinical workflow – from pre-procedural planning to intraprocedural guidance and post-procedural documentation. The overall goal is to improve patient outcomes, increase procedural efficiency, and promote the safe and ethical integration of AI in clinical decision-making.

Visit the official SHERPA project website for further details about the project, partners, and updates.

CIRSE’s role

With CIRSE’s unique network of interventional radiologists worldwide and expertise in the development of training and education formats, CIRSE will contribute to SHERPA as a partner in work packages one (FRAME), five (PROMOTE), and six (ORGANISE).

CIRSE will be the task leader for the education and training of healthcare professionals, designing and delivering a high-quality education and training programme through different webinars and face-to-face training workshops, enabling the safe and effective integration of new technologies into daily clinical practice. In work packages one and six, CIRSE will support the work package leaders with our expertise and wide reach in the IR community, making sure that the practitioners’ perspectives inform the development of innovations in the field of interventional oncology.

Read the CIRSE Insider interview with Dr. Maarten Smits, one of CIRSE’s key opinion leaders involved in SHERPA, about his expectations for the project.

SHERPA at CIRSE 2025

SHERPA was represented with a dedicated booth at SPHAIRE during the CIRSE 2025 annual congress. Dr. Pietro Zappala gave a talk entitled “SHERPA: Integrating robotics, AI, and AR in Interventional Radiology.” Watch his presentation!

For more information, please visit the SHERPA project website or contact us at [email protected].