Press release
December 16, 2021
4 mins

Owkin and Amgen use AI to improve cardiovascular risk prediction

Owkin and Amgen are delighted to announce the results of a three-year project on cardiovascular risk prediction. This study demonstrates the use of artificial intelligence to improve the way that clinicians predict patients’ risk of suffering major cardiovascular events, such as strokes and myocardial infarctions.

Using data from 13,756 patients who were part of FOURIER, a large Amgen clinical trial, Owkin trained a machine-learning algorithm to predict those at higher risk of cardiovascular events. Published in the December issue of the European Heart Journal – Digital Health, the results show that machine learning is more efficient and effective than the statistical models routinely used by clinicians.

Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death in Europe, responsible for 45% of all deaths. It represents a considerable economic burden, costing an estimated €210 billion in the European Union alone. By better predicting which patients will suffer major cardiovascular events, we can now drastically improve both patient outcomes and efficiency.

By improving the ability to predict cardiovascular events, clinicians are better able to prevent them. Identifying at-risk patients sooner will allow them to benefit from better care, adapted to their individual risk profile. Thus, identified patients will benefit from better follow-up and therapeutic management adapted to their risk level. With electronic medical records being more complete and prevalent than ever before, the use of machine learning to better predict cardiovascular risk could have wide application.

We are delighted that our collaboration, which began in 2016, has yielded compelling scientific results that could fundamentally improve patient monitoring and treatment. We look forward to continuing this project with Amgen to translate these scientific findings into clinical applications.

Jean-Frédéric Petit-Nivard, SVP Commercial & Product Strategy at Owkin

After more than 3 years of collaboration, we are very proud to have our results recognized and published in a prestigious scientific journal for cardiologists worldwide. We hope that this work will contribute to the next generation of tools that will help in saving more lives.

Adrien Rousset, Head of Augmented Diagnostics at Amgen

This project has allowed us to explore the value of Machine Learning for cardiovascular risk prediction and gain important insights into the use of clinical data.

Dr. Marc S. Sabatine, the Lewis Dexter, MD Distinguished Chair in Cardiovascular Medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School

For five years, Owkin and Amgen have been collaborating on projects across cardiology, hematology and oncology to develop clinical applications for artificial intelligence.

Last month, Owkin became a ‘unicorn’ – a startup valued at over $1 billion – through a $180 million investment from Sanofi, announced alongside $90 million of joint cancer research projects.

Authors
Owkin
About Owkin

Owkin is the first end-to-end TechBio company on a mission to understand complex biology and derive new multimodal biomarkers through AI. We identify precision therapeutics, de-risk and accelerate clinical trials and develop diagnostics using AI trained on world-class patient data through privacy-enhancing federated technologies.

We merge wet lab experiments with advanced AI techniques to create a powerful feedback loop for accelerated discovery and innovation in oncology, cardiovascular, immunity and inflammation. Owkin also founded MOSAIC, the world’s largest spatial multi-omics atlas for cancer research.

Owkin has raised over $300 million through investments from leading biopharma companies, including Sanofi and BMS, and venture funds like Fidelity, GV and Bpifrance, among others.