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July 2026 Supplement
Sponsored by The PERT Consortium®
PERT International: Connecting a Global Community to Advance Pulmonary Embolism Care
Exploring how PERT International is expanding multidisciplinary pulmonary embolism care through global collaboration, education, research, quality improvement, and shared best practices.
By Bushra Mina, MD, FCCM, FCCP, FACP, FNIV; Sameh Sayfo, MD, MBA, FSCAI, FACC; and Rachel P. Rosovsky, MD, MPH
Pulmonary embolism (PE) remains one of the world’s leading causes of cardiovascular mortality, yet its diagnosis and management continue to challenge health care systems around the globe. Patients often present with a wide spectrum of symptoms—from mild shortness of breath to life-threatening cardiovascular collapse—requiring rapid assessment and coordinated treatment decisions. Acute PE represents a highly heterogeneous disease process requiring individualized treatment decisions based on hemodynamic status, right ventricular dysfunction, bleeding risk, clot burden, and patient-specific comorbidities. Consequently, timely multidisciplinary evaluation has emerged as an important strategy for optimizing patient selection and therapeutic decision-making.
The multidisciplinary PE response team (PERT) model has become an adopted framework for coordinating care for PE patients, bringing together specialists from multiple disciplines to make timely, evidence-based decisions. Published data support the clinical value of this approach—PERT implementation has been associated with shorter time to anticoagulation initiation, reduced hospital length of stay including intensive care unit stay, increased use of advanced therapies without a corresponding increase in bleeding complications, and in some reports a sustained reduction in mortality. Reflecting this evidence, the 2026 American Heart Association/American College of Cardiology (AHA/ACC) guideline for the evaluation and management of acute PE in adults—the first de novo joint clinical practice guideline dedicated exclusively to acute PE from the AHA and ACC, published simultaneously in Circulation and Journal of the American College of Cardiology—provides a class 1 recommendation for the use of multidisciplinary PERTs to improve in-hospital care delivery.1,2
With the steady growth and expansion of the PERT model across North America and its promising growth across other regions, the opportunities for greater international collaboration have become increasingly apparent. Clinical expertise, research, education, and quality improvement efforts all benefit when institutions can share experiences beyond geographic boundaries. Recognizing this opportunity, The National PERT Consortium® established PERT International, an initiative designed to unite health care professionals and systems worldwide around a common goal: improving outcomes for all patients with PE through collaboration, research, education, and innovation.
THE PERT INTERNATIONAL INITIATIVE
Recognizing the growing adoption of the PERT model beyond North America and the opportunity for greater international collaboration, The PERT Consortium® established PERT International, a global initiative dedicated to advancing the care of patients with PE by bringing together hospitals, health care professionals, and multidisciplinary teams from around the world. The mission of PERT International is to foster international collaboration, promote evidence-based education, and accelerate innovation to improve outcomes for patients with PE across diverse health care systems.
Beyond serving as a collaborative network, PERT International provides a framework for hospitals seeking to develop or strengthen multidisciplinary PERTs. Through educational resources, mentorship, best practice guidelines, protocol algorithm development, and access to an international community of experts, the initiative supports institutions in overcoming clinical, organizational, and resource-related barriers that may limit the implementation of comprehensive PE programs. To facilitate knowledge and experience exchange, the initiative leverages international conferences, webinars, multidisciplinary case discussions, educational curricula, alongside quality improvement initiatives tailored to regional needs.
Recognizing that health care systems vary significantly across countries, PERT International embraces flexible implementation strategies that respect local resources, infrastructure, and practice patterns while maintaining the core principles of timely diagnosis, multidisciplinary decision-making, coordinated care, equitable access to advanced therapies, quality improvement via data gathering, and longitudinal patient follow-up.
EXTENDING THE PERT MODEL TO GLOBAL PRACTICE
A core strength of the PERT model lies in its adaptability. Although the principles of multidisciplinary PE management are universal, successful implementation depends on the clinical infrastructure, specialist expertise, referral pathways, resources, and treatment capabilities available at each institution. PERT programs are therefore designed to meet local needs while maintaining a shared commitment to timely evaluation, multidisciplinary decision-making, evidence-based treatment, and coordinated patient care.
PERT International facilitates the exchange of implementation strategies, clinical expertise, best operational practices, and educational resources, while fostering discussions of complex cases and programmatic challenges. By learning from the experiences of diverse health care systems, participating centers can refine patient triage, optimize treatment pathways, strengthen multidisciplinary collaboration, and improve care coordination.
As the network continues to grow, the collective experience of participating centers provides valuable insights into effective models of care, helping to identify best practices and reduce variability in management across diverse clinical settings.
EDUCATION AS THE FOUNDATION FOR BETTER PE CARE
Advances in PE management continue to evolve rapidly on a global scale. Driven by new clinical evidence, emerging technologies, updated treatment guidelines, and expanding research into risk stratification and intervention, optimal care strategies often vary by region. Through webinars, educational programming, scientific meetings, and professional networking opportunities, PERT International facilitates access to educational resources that support both experienced clinicians and institutions developing new multidisciplinary PE programs.
The PERT Consortium®’s Annual Pulmonary Embolism Scientific Symposium serves as a cornerstone of these educational efforts. Bringing together physicians, researchers, nurses, advanced practice providers, program coordinators, administrators, and industry leaders under one roof, the meeting offers opportunities to discuss new research findings, review new guideline recommendations, evaluate clinical cases, explore innovative therapies, and strengthen professional relationships across specialties.
These educational initiatives help ensure that clinicians remain informed about evolving best practices while encouraging collaboration between institutions that may otherwise have limited opportunities to interact.
PERT International members are encouraged to participate in the PERT Consortium® Education Committee, where they can contribute to educational programs, share expertise, and collaborate with an international network of PE specialists. Participation provides opportunities for professional development, leadership, and the exchange of best practices to advance multidisciplinary PE care worldwide.
ADVANCING RESEARCH THROUGH GLOBAL COLLABORATION
Scientific progress depends on data, collaboration, and diverse patient populations. Participating institutions have the opportunity to contribute to and utilize the PERT Registry, a comprehensive real-world clinical database that supports quality improvement, observational research, and multicenter scientific collaboration. By pooling data from diverse health care systems, participating centers can benchmark clinical outcomes and performance metrics, identify opportunities for quality improvement, evaluate real-world practice patterns, and contribute to research that advances the understanding and management of PE.
International participation meaningfully expands the diversity of clinical experiences available for study. Differences in patient demographics, health care delivery models, and approaches to treatment across participating countries create an opportunity to better understand how clinical and systems-level factors influence presentation, management, and outcomes of PE-related questions that cannot be addressed by single-center or single-country studies alone. The inclusion of diverse international populations also creates a platform for collaborative translational research, enabling investigators to explore geographic and population-based differences in disease susceptibility, treatment response, and long-term outcomes.
BUILDING RECOGNITION THROUGH INTERNATIONAL AFFILIATION
Participation in PERT International extends beyond networking opportunities to support recognition for organizations committed to advancing PE care. Institutions become part of a global community dedicated to multidisciplinary excellence, and members can participate on Consortium committees, contribute to educational initiatives, collaborate on publications, and engage in leadership activities that help shape the future direction of PE care.
As programs mature, PERT International provides guidance and mentorship toward achieving designation as a PERT Center of Excellence—recognizing institutions that demonstrate excellence in multidisciplinary collaboration, standardized clinical pathways, timely access to advanced therapies, continuous quality improvement, education, research, and patient-centered care.
As the international network continues to expand, institutional affiliation provides a platform for sustained collaboration among clinicians and investigators working to advance evidence-based PE management and improve patient outcomes across diverse practice environments.
A GROWING INTERNATIONAL NETWORK
PERT International has expanded to include health care organizations across multiple continents, reflecting growing global interest in multidisciplinary approaches to PE management. Participating institutions represent diverse health care systems and practice environments, including centers in Asia (United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Singapore), Europe (Greece, Spain, Ukraine), South America (Argentina), Australia, and the Dominican Republic. This geographic diversity provides a unique opportunity to evaluate PE management across a broad range of patient populations, referral patterns, resource settings, and treatment paradigms. It also enhances our understanding of how cultural, social, and ethical factors influence clinical decision-making, patient preferences, and health care delivery in different regions of the world. Furthermore, the inclusion of diverse populations creates a valuable platform for collaborative translational and genetic research, enabling investigators to explore geographic and population-based differences in disease susceptibility, genetic risk factors, treatment response, and long-term outcomes. Together, these international collaborations broaden the scientific understanding of PE while promoting more equitable, culturally informed, and patient-centered care. The active participation of international hospital representatives on PERT Consortium committees—such as the Education and Clinical Trials Committees—has been immensely valuable, significantly enriching our understanding of regional health care needs worldwide.
Beyond expanding the reach of the PERT model, the growing international network strengthens opportunities for collaborative education, multicenter research, and quality improvement initiatives. Participation from institutions with varying levels of experience and different models of care facilitates the exchange of clinical expertise, implementation strategies, and operational best practices while fostering multidisciplinary partnerships that extend beyond individual health care systems.
FUTURE DIRECTIONS FOR PERT INTERNATIONAL AND GLOBAL PE CARE
The growth of PERT International reflects a global recognition that coordinated, multidisciplinary PE care improves outcomes—and the work ahead is as important as what has already been accomplished. Several priority areas will shape the future direction of PERT International:
- Expanding the global network. PERT International will continue to grow its membership across the world, with particular focus on expanding into areas where PE care infrastructure is developing. Broader geographic representation strengthens the scientific value of the international registry, increases the diversity of populations studied, and advances the mission of delivering high-quality PE care across all health care settings.
- Generating international registry evidence and trial participation. The PERT Registry represents one of the most valuable tools available for understanding real-world PE management across diverse health care systems. Continuing to expand registry participation internationally will enable multicenter observational studies, comparative effectiveness research, and quality improvement initiatives that reflect the full spectrum of global PE care. The field of PE is simultaneously experiencing an unprecedented era of clinical trial activity, with recent and ongoing international trials investigating novel pharmacologic agents, catheter-based interventional strategies, and emerging approaches to risk stratification fundamentally reshaping how PE is managed. Many of these trials are in partnership with The PERT Consortium®, and the results of this research are already influencing clinical practice globally. PERT International serves as a natural vehicle through which this evolving evidence can be rapidly disseminated, implemented into clinical practice, and evaluated in real-world settings across diverse health care systems—translating trial findings into improved patient care at an international scale. Membership in PERT International also opens meaningful opportunities for participating centers and investigators to engage directly in the most important and scientifically advanced clinical research in PE, providing access to trial networks, experienced investigators, and collaborative research infrastructure that individual institutions or national programs may not otherwise have access to, regardless of their size or geographic location.
- Reducing global disparities in PE care. Significant disparities exist in PE diagnosis, access to advanced therapies, and clinical outcomes across geographic regions and health care systems. PERT International is positioned to characterize these disparities through registry data, identify their drivers, and support quality improvement and implementation initiatives aimed at delivering more equitable PE care worldwide, including guidance on adapting PERT models for institutions with limited access to advanced interventional therapies.
- Advancing post-PE care globally. The long-term consequences of PE—including chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension, post-PE syndrome, functional impairment, and recurrence risk—represent a growing clinical and research priority. PERT International's network is well positioned to support the development of structured longitudinal follow-up programs across participating centers, generate international real-world data on post-PE outcomes, and promote adoption of standardized follow-up protocols that reflect the 2026 AHA/ACC guideline recommendations for longitudinal PE care.
- Strengthening education and mentorship internationally. As new centers join PERT International from diverse health care environments, the need for tailored educational resources and mentorship programs grows accordingly. Future priorities include continuing to develop region-specific educational curricula, expanding access to case-based learning platforms and international webinars, and creating structured mentorship pathways that connect developing PERT programs with established Centers of Excellence, accelerating the growth of high-quality PE care in institutions at every stage of program development.
By integrating collaborative research, implementation science, education, and multidisciplinary clinical expertise, PERT International is helping establish a global framework for advancing evidence-based PE care and improving outcomes for patients worldwide.
1. Writing Committee Members; Creager MA, Barnes GD, Giri J, et al. 2026 AHA/ACC/ACCP/ACEP/CHEST/SCAI/SHM/SIR/SVM/SVN guideline for the evaluation and management of acute pulmonary embolism in adults: a report of the American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association Joint Committee on Clinical Practice Guidelines. Circulation. 2026;153:e977-e1051. doi: 10.1161/CIR.0000000000001415
2. Creager MA, Barnes GD, Giri J, et al. 2026 AHA/ACC/ACCP/ACEP/CHEST/SCAI/SHM/SIR/SVM/SVN guideline for the evaluation and management of acute pulmonary embolism in adults: a report of the American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association Joint Committee on Clinical Practice Guidelines. J Am Coll Cardiol. 2026;87:1626-1710. doi: 10.1016/j.jacc.2025.11.005
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