Atrium Health has enlisted Siemens Healthineers as its first strategic partner in the set up of the IRCAD North America research and experiential training center, where physicians will learn and collaborate on projects around novel surgical techniques.

The center will be located in “The Pearl,” a medical district currently being constructed in Charlotte, North Carolina, and will be located on the second campus of the Wake Forest School of Medicine, which is part of Atrium Health, and will be the city’s first four-year medical school.

IRCAD North America is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Atrium Health, and will be the only North American headquarters for IRCAD, a research and training institute in France that trains surgeons in minimally invasive surgery.

The center’s curriculum will include robotics, medical virtual and augmented reality, surgical artificial intelligence, and simulation training; providing lessons to both experienced physicians and healthcare trainees.

"While IRCAD is known around the world for advanced training in general surgery, interventional gastroenterology and interventional radiology, IRCAD North America will be unique in also offering experiential training in cardiovascular interventions, orthopedic surgery and neurosurgery," Dr. Dionisios Vrochides, chief of the transplant oncology section and vice chairman of the department of surgery at Wake Forest University School of Medicine and Atrium Health, told HCB News.

Siemens Healthineers will help develop this curriculum and provide educational support and medical imaging scanners, including its ARTIS icono biplane and ARTIS pheno interventional angiography X-ray units, the Cios Spin 3D-capable mobile C-arm, the SOMATOM Edge Plus CT scanner, and the MAGNETOM Free.Max wide-bore MR scanner.

IRCAD announced in March 2022 that IRCAD North America would be located in The Pearl, saying that its proximity to the Wake Forest University School of Medicine – Charlotte would allow it to “grow and excel.”

Atrium Health, which merged with Advocate Aurora Health in December 2022 to create Advocate Health, the third largest nonprofit healthcare system in the U.S., says the center will be a super-magnet for drawing in businesses and doctors to address health and equity challenges.

Atrium Health established a Value Partnership with Siemens Healthineers in November 2022, agreeing to purchase $140 million in equipment for distribution across its 40 hospitals and more than 1,400 care locations in North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and Alabama, including advanced imaging, radiation oncology, and precision endovascular robotics technology to improve health equity in rural and underserved areas.

IRCAD North America is expected to open in late 2025.

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