Clinical Fellows 2026

Stiftung Charité supports outstanding personalities and innovative projects across the entire spectrum of the life sciences through various programs. Some of these programs are specifically designed to address the unique characteristics of career paths in university medicine, with its diverse intersections between research and clinical practice. In particular, the Clinician Scientist Program, developed and initiated by the Stiftung Charité, has since become established far beyond Berlin and has paved the way for a new career path during the specialist training phase. 

With the Clinical Fellows program, the Stiftung Charité aims not only to support individual personalities and projects, but also to provide structural support for transitions between science and the clinic and, in doing so, to shape appropriate career paths - in this case for physicians at advanced stages of their careers. The program is aimed at physicians who bear primary responsibility for patient care in their respective field and who contribute to the quality and further development of high-quality patient care through their clinical work.

In the current call, the program is being opened for the first time to an expanded target group as part of a pilot approach. In addition to senior physicians (German: "Oberarzt/Oberärztin" position), experienced board-certified specialists (German: "Facharzt/Fachärztin" position) are also eligible to apply.

Clinical fellows are experienced and highly accomplished physicians who hold significant clinical responsibilities and possess proven expertise in patient care. Through their work, they shape the quality and advancement of care in their respective specialties. Stiftung Charité supports them through projects that are inspired by their clinical engagement and thus promise added value for their own clinical practice in patient care as well as for their further clinical-scientific career development. 

In contrast to primarily research-oriented funding programs, the focus is not on scientific competitiveness but on clinical expertise, responsibility, and the concrete contribution to the quality of care.

The funding is intended to provide these experienced clinicians with protected time that is otherwise not available in everyday clinical care and for which no comparable funding opportunities currently exist in the publicly funded science and healthcare system. 

Clinical Fellows can apply for projects that can be classified under the following headings:

• knowledge acquisition / own further educationand training (e.g. attendance of specialized scientific or clinical further education or training programs, systematic participation in academic events or training on the job measures),
• knowledge exchange with other university medicine locations or relevant actors in the scientific and healthcare system in Germany and abroad (e.g. hospitations or transfer projects),
• knowledge transfer (e.g. offering university courses and lectures or novel educational formats, information events for a broader public, innovative publication projects, provided they clearly go beyond the mere publication of scientific results), and
• research projects, provided that they do not primarily pursue a scientific question, but have a very clear clinical application orientation and are also flanked by measures under the aforementioned headings of knowledge acquisition, knowledge exchange or knowledge transfer.

Applications that, without a research project, are aimed solely at the individual's own knowledge acquisition, the exchange of knowledge or the transfer of knowledge are explicitly encouraged within the Clinical Fellows program.

Pure research projects, including clinical (pilot) studies and trials, will not be funded through the Clinical Fellows program. They might be eligible for public third-party funding, though.

A Clinical Fellow receives funding of up to 75,000.00 euros for a total period of up to 36 months.

The Clinical Fellows may use the designation “Clinical Fellow, funded by Stiftung Charité”. 

Funding may consist of personnel and material funds that are needed to carry out the project applied for.

In accordance with the funding objectives of the program, the focus should be on personnel funds with which the Clinical Fellow is granted protected time through release from clinical duties for the project.

In the case of a Clinical Fellow who is employed full-time, the leave is granted by employing clinical replacement personnel in the respective clinic using the provided personnel funds. The clinical replacement personnel must be additionally employed to the extent that the Clinical Fellow is released from medical duties in the clinic to pursue his/her project, e.g. by hiring new medical staff or by increasing part-time medical staff.

In the case of a Clinical Fellow employed on a part-time basis, it is possible to grant protected time for the project by using the personnel funds provided to increase the Clinical Fellow's own position by up to 25 percent of the full-time equivalent. The relevant reference is the scope of employment at the time of application. Subsequent changes in the extent of medical employment in the clinic from that indicated in the application will usually not be considered.

Personnel funds may also be used in part to hire scientific or technical personnel to carry out the project. In any case, the Clinical Fellow must be able to lead the project in terms of time.

In addition to personnel funds, material resources required to pursue the project may be funded.

The funding of a Clinical Fellow by Stiftung Charité is carried out in the form of an approval addressed to Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin (Charité) for onward transfer to the Clinical Fellow; Charité remains the employer of the persons funded by Stiftung Charité and administers the granted funds. There are no contractual relationships between Stiftung Charité and the Clinical Fellow.

Applications can be submitted by all those who

• are currently employed at the Charité (including the Berlin Institute of Health at Charité and the German Heart Center of Charité) as senior physicians (German: "Oberarzt/Oberärztin" position) or board-certified specialists (German: "Facharzt/Fachärztin" position),
• can demonstrate at least four years of professional experience following board certification at the time of application; a doctoral degree is expected,
• currently perform predominantly patient care duties and are not already performing research and teaching duties to a significant extent through leave arrangements already agreed with Charité or through other external funding, and
• are recognized to have a particularly high level of performance within their clinic. For board-certified specialists who do not (yet) hold a senior physician position (Ä3), this must be demonstrated by a mandatory letter of support from the clinic’s medical director detailing the applicant’s clinical expertise and performance, responsibilities, and contribution to the quality of care.

The respective head of the clinic in which the applicant works as a physician must in all cases support the application and give a binding commitment that, in the event of funding, the leave of absence will be granted in the manner applied for. 

Resubmissions with the same or a very similar project are allowed only once. Appointed professors are not eligible to apply.

The proposal consists of

1. information on the applicant’s own clinical and scientific qualifications and achievements (incl. CV and, where relevant, a selected list of up to five own publications most relevant to the project; no complete publication list may be submitted),
2. a description of the applicant's area of medical responsibility in the respective clinic and the applicant's main areas of focus in patient care during the last four years, 
3. a description of the project with special emphasis on its added value for the applicant's own medical activity in his/her individual patient care context,
4. a declaration signed by the respective clinic and center leadership confirming that, in the event of funding, the requested protected time will be granted as proposed. Please use the designated form, and
5. only for board-certified specialists who do not (yet) hold a senior physician position: a letter of support from the clinic leadership that outlines the applicant’s clinical expertise and performance, assumed responsibilities, the contribution to the quality of care, and the expected added value of the project for medical practice.

In evaluating the application, the primary focus is on the applicant’s clinical achievements and the expected added value of the project for medical practice. Scientific qualifications and experience should be taken into account; however, the applicant’s success in recent years in standard competitions for third-party research funding is not decisive. 

Applications must be submitted via the online portal. Please note that you must register before using the portal for the first time.

By submitting an application, the applicant declares that he or she has read Stiftung Charité’s grant conditions (Bewilligungsgrundsätze) as well as the program information which his or her application refers and accepts them as the legally binding basis for any funding of his or her project. Furthermore, the applicant acknowledges Stiftung Charité's standards for the realization of funded projects and data protection information (Datenschutzhinweise).

Applications are submitted to Stiftung Charité, where they are reviewed for formal eligibility. Stiftung Charité subsequently conducts a review procedure. For each formally admissible application, a statement is obtained from the Charité's Chief Medical Officer, and evaluations are carried out by a selection panel appointed by Stiftung Charité and consisting of experienced clinicians from the Charité and external experts. Based on the statement and evaluations obtained, the top-ranked applicants are invited to a selection colloquium, where they present their project and answer questions from the selection panel.

The panel makes its funding recommendations on the basis of the selection colloquium. Stiftung Charité’s Board of Trustees makes the final funding decisions.