Title Promoter Affiliations Abstract "Advanced personalised, multi-scale computer models preventing OsteoArthritis" "Sabine Verschueren" "Research Group for Musculoskeletal Rehabilitation" "Osteoarthritis (OA) is a degenerative disease of the articular cartilage and the most common form of arthritis that causes joint pain, mobility limitation and, thus, reduces independence and overall quality of life. Although the usual population associated with the condition is the elderly (65 years old ranges from 12- 30%), who are mostly inactive, athletes and younger individuals are also susceptible. Whilst the available data have implicated the role of the various modifiable or non-modifiable risk factors in the development and progression of OA, no study has conclusively explored the interaction and integration of other information sets in a patient-specific manner. The current OACTIVE project intents to make a significant leap forward adopting a multi-scale holistic approach where patient-specific information from various levels, including cell, tissue, organ and whole body will be integrated and combined with information from other sources such as biochemical/inflammatory biomarkers, behaviour modeling and social/environmental risk factors to generate robust predictors for new personalised interventions for delaying onset and slowing down progression of OA. OACTIVE targets to patient-specific OA prediction and interventions by using a combination of mechanistic, phenomenological computational models, simulations and big data analytics. Once constructed, these models will be used to simulate and predict optimal treatments, better diagnostics, and improved patient outcomes. Overcoming the limitation of the current treatment interventions, Augmented Reality empowered interventions will be developed in a personalised framework allowing patients experience the treatment as more enjoyable, resulting in greater motivation, engagement, and training adherence. OACTIVE’s mission is to improve healthcare by transforming and accelerating the OA diagnosis and prediction based on a more comprehensive understanding of disease pathophysiology, dynamics, and patient outcomes." "A PeRsOnalized Prevention roadmap for the future HEalThcare" "Mahsa Shabani" "Department of Criminology, Criminal Law and Social Law, National Institute of Health Dr. Ricardo Jorge, KU Leuven, GAC, ASSOCIAZIONE CITTADINANZATTIVA ONLUS, Biobanking and Biomolecular Resources Research Infrastructure Consortium, Catholic University of the Sacred Heart, European Molecular Biology Laboratory, University of Tartu, Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare, European Public Health Association, European Patients Forum, Amsterdam UMC Location VUmc, Karolinska Institute, ALLELICA SRL, University of Debrecen" "The change from the treatment of established diseases to prevention is a challenge. The development of targeted interventions represents a promising paradigm shift, making personalised approaches the future of prevention. In this context, PROPHET will support the implementation of innovative, sustainable and effective personalised programmes to prevent common chronic diseases, through the development of a strategic research&innovation roadmap (SRIA). Specifically, the project will focus on stakeholder engagement (including citizens, patients and healthcare professionals), a mapping of the latest research advancements in Personalised Prevention and capacity building activities." "A PeRsOnalized Prevention roadmap for the future HEalThcare" "Pascal Borry" "Interfaculty Centre for Biomedical Ethics and Law" "PROPHET - a PeRsOnalized Prevention roadmap for the future HEalThcare"""" will develop a Strategic Research and Innovation Agenda (SRIA) for Personalized Prevention, in order to support the implementation of innovative, sustainable and effective personalized programmes to prevent common chronic diseases. Technological biomedical advances (including omics data and digital tools) make risk stratification at the individual level possible. However, development of Personalized Prevention approaches must be accompanied by healthcare system transition, including citizen engagement, healthcare professional education and addressing organisational, social and legal issues. PROPHET will be centred around stakeholder engagement and the SRIA co-creation process in relation to three main strands of activities: Mapping, Assessment, and Building. Firstly, we will summarize, evaluate and discuss with the relevant stakeholders the extent to which all these new technologies can synergise (Mapping). Secondly, we will design a holistic framework (the PROPHET Framework) that will include all the necessary aspects to appraise Personalized Prevention approaches and their adoption by Public Health Authorities (Assessment). Thirdly, we will support the introduction of Personalised Prevention Programmes by providing guidelines for their design, engaging with healthcare professionals (especially those working with policy makers), and increasing health literacy at the population level on the benefits of Personalized Prevention (Building). PROPHET will liaise with other key current and forthcoming initiatives at EU level, such as ICPerMed, European Partnership (EP) PerMed, the CSA Beyond 1 Million Genomes (B1MG), and the EP on Transforming Health and Care Systems. The consortium consists of 18 beneficiaries and 2 affiliated entities across 12 EU Countries, and a large number of stakeholders already engaged from different Target Groups." "CoroPrevention : Personalized Prevention for Coronary Heart Disease" "Human-Computer Interaction and eHealth, Applied Computer Science Lab, Cardio & organ systems" "European Coronary Heart Disease (CHD) burden is unsustainable. Better risk stratification tools and personalized care of patients are needed for reducing morbidity and mortality of CHD and the associated economic burden. To this end we have planned to shape and implement a personalized secondary prevention program for patients with established CHD. This precision strategy will be tested in a prospective trial, the CoroPrevention Trial, a central element of our proposal. We aim to significantly reduce the numbers of coronary events by using outcome risk- and patient characteristics- guided prevention in CHD patients. 1. Prospectively evaluate clinical utility of personalized prevention in CHD 2. Evaluate health economic and social benefits of the personalized prevention in CHD 3. Discover predictive markers of drug treatment response in CHD 4. Improve current ESC guidelines based on RCT validated clinical data 5. Disseminate the refined prevention program to the attention of practitioners, patients, health care payers and policy makers This program will establish a new economically sustainable personalized treatment practice applicable throughout Europe particularly to those regions where CHD prevention needs upgrading. The used protocols and technologies will carefully assessed by NICE using their standard evaluation methods that will allow independent expert opinions for different European authorities and decision makers. These opinion statements will further be supported by full Health Economics analyses of CoroPrevention Trial. UHasselt is mainly coordinating and involved in the work package defining the prevention/rehabilitation program and providing the supporting software applications." "Discreet, personalised epileptic seizure detection device" "Sabine Van Huffel" "Laboratory for Epilepsy Research, Dynamical Systems, Signal Processing and Data Analytics (STADIUS)" "SeizeIT2 is a clinically accurate seizure detection system for people with epilepsy. This discreet wearable device monitors several biosignals to allow a more precise quantitative analysis of seizure activity, so that people with epilepsy can receive treatment optimised for their specific condition.SeizeIT is a proof-of-concept device enabling precise, objective logging of seizures for people with epilepsy. The first prototype of this wearable allows comfortable and unobtrusive seizure monitoring outside of a hospital setting.SeizeIT2 comprises an improvement over seizure diaries, in which patients keep a record of their own seizures. SeizeIT2 provides 70-90% accuracy, compared to the accuracy level of less than 50% that is typical for a seizure diary, and it offers an improved patient experience. Benefits of the device include its discreet, unobtrusive design and its multimodal system, which measures several clinical biosignals, such as brain activity, circulation, respiration and other parameters. Another advantage of the device is its ability to monitor seizures around the clock.The device has been tested by more than 70 patients with temporal lobe epilepsy,, a condition affecting around 20 million people globally, and eight patients with absence epilepsy. Preparation is underway for next steps, including multi-centre clinical validation of at least 500 patients, medical certification and initiation of scalable production. The prototype’s intelligent design allows increased functionality over time, offering the opportunity to go from the initial “EEG holter monitor” to a real-time monitoring and alerting system.ImpactThe greater accuracy of seizure monitoring permitted by SeizeIT2 can benefit:Patients, by maximising the impact of medicines through a more accurate evaluation of their treatment response.Seizure drug developers and clinical researchers.Pharma researchers, undertaking patient stratification or seeking to shorten the duration of clinical studies.SeizeIT2 also holds longer term promise as a seizure alarm (SUDEP prevention) and seizure prediction tool for patients." "Target : Health virtual twins for the personalised management of stroke related to atrial fibrillation" "Bart Jansen" "Center for Research and Technology - Hellas, Vienna University of Technology, Radboud University Nijmegen Medical Centre, Institut national polytechnique de Toulouse, Lund University, European Commission, Electronics and Informatics" "TARGET’s ambition is to develop novel personalised, integrated, multi-scale computational models (virtual twins) and decision-support tools for the AF-related stroke pathway, starting from the healthy state, pathophysiology and disease onset, progression, treatment and recovery. TARGET aims to help prevent AF and AFRS, optimise acute management and rehabilitation, reduce long-term disability, provide a better quality of life for patients and caregivers, and lower healthcare costs. We will ensure patients are at the heart of the project, and the association with experienced commercial partners will ensure the swift adoption of TARGET’s novel technologies" "The human genetic and immunological determinants of the clinical manifestations of SARS-CoV-2 infection: Towards personalised medicine" "Isabelle Meyts" "Inborn Errors of Immunity" "The consequences of SARS-CoV-2 exposure range from a lack of infection to lethal COVID-19. This immense inter-individual clinical variability is the key scientific and medical enigma in the field. While age and certain co-morbidities are known to influence disease outcome, these parameters do not explain all variation. In addition, there are other SARS-CoV-2 phenotypes of clinical importance: multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children and adults (MIS-C/A), and longCOVID. An important breakthrough to unravel the pathogenesis of COVID-19 came from our two Science papers that were recognized by Nature among the top 10 discoveries of 2020. We found that about 4% of patients with critical COVID-19 pneumonia had inborn errors of immunity (IEI) that impair TLR3- and IRF7-dependent type I interferon (IFN) immunity and at least 10% of the patients carried pre-existing autoantibodies (auto-Abs) neutralizing type I IFNs. These findings pave the way for further studies of COVID-19 pneumonia and other SARS-CoV-2 infection phenotypes and form the basis of the present research proposal, UNDINE, which follows a """"bed side to bench"""" and """"bench to bed side"""" approach, with the following objectivies i) to decipher the genetic and immunological basis of the various SARS-CoV-2 disease manifestations, to identify individuals at increased risk of critical COVID-19, post-infectious immunological complications, and vaccine failure iii) to develop ready-to-use diagnostic tests for large-scale detection of auto-Abs to type I IFNs and propose novel preventive and therapeutic approaches, based on the pathogenesis of SARS-CoV-2 infection for translation into personalised medicine. To achieve these goals, our project will coordinate a European multidisciplinary and translational research effort relying on a strong and synergistic combination of assets, including unique cohorts from 11 EU countries and state-of-the art human genetic, immunological and virological expertises and technologies" "Development, diagnostic and prevention of gender-related Somatic and mental COmorbitiEs in iRritable bowel syndrome In Europe" "Lukas Van Oudenhove" "Translational Research in GastroIntestinal Disorders" "Mental (anxiety and depression) and non-mental (fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome) comorbidities are highly prevalent in irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), with over 60 million Europeans affected, mostly women, by devastating manifestations, impaired treatment and quality of life. Estimated costs are €43 billion/year for IBS, mostly derived from comorbid IBS. Our hypothesis is that comorbid IBS represents a distinct clinical entity, arising from distorted brain-gut communication with a unique, specific, but undefined pathophysiological origin, differing from IBS alone. DISCOvERIE was created to advance the understanding of its causative mechanisms. Identification, validation and comprehension of these mechanisms will help stratify these patients into distinct clinical phenotypes, improving disease management, increasing quality of life and reducing socioeconomic costs. In particular, we will deliver specific comorbid-IBS physiopathological knowledge as clinical guides and protocols for newly created, hospital-based, transversal and multidisciplinary units for implementing personalized management and wellbeing of European citizens and to position Europe as a global leader in comorbid IBS personalised medicine. We will also deliver prognostic and therapeutic biomarkers and patents, technological innovation via e-health tools for personalized assessment of clinical/nutritional/physical activity and disseminate new knowledge widely. Impact will be assessed by recording media presence, scientific publications and by monitoring health-related quality of life of patients and promoting cost-effective care. To this end we have created a user board involving patient associations, clinical specialists, European healthcare experts, large pharma and SMEs representatives. We will also promote the creation of a European Reference Network for comorbid IBS involving healthcare providers across Europe." "Dynamic MOdelling of REsilience" "Inez Germeys" "Contextual Psychiatry" "The project DynaMORE (Dynamic MOdelling of REsilience) exploits advanced mathematical modelling for the promotion of mental health and well-being. DynaMORE will generate the first personalised in-silico model of mental health in the face of adversity, that is, stress resilience. The model will be based on and validated against unique multi-scale longitudinal real-world empirical data sets. The development and testing of the model will substantially deepen our scientific understanding of the mechanisms of resilience. These insights will allow us to create mechanistically targeted interventions for the primary prevention of stress-related disorders. On this basis, DynaMORE will develop an entirely new mHealth product that will include model-based prognostic tools for monitoring of at-risk subjects and for automatised decision-making about timed, personalised interventions. The DynaMORE model will be openly available, whereas the interventions and surrounding application solutions (data analysis tools, information and communication technology (ICT)) will have a strong potential for commercial exploitation, which will be actively prepared within DynaMORE.These objectives will be achieved through the interdisciplinary collaboration of world-leading experts in the fields of (1) computer-modelling and simulation and multi-scale data integration (project area MODELLING), (2) bio-psycho-social research on mental health and resilience (area HUMAN LIVES), and (3) mHealth technology, including ambulatory monitoring and intervention, and ICT (area TECHNOLOGY). These will be supported, and results will be exploited, by an experienced management and impact maximisation team (area IMPACT).The overall aim of DynaMORE is to improve human lives by preventing stress-related mental health problems. DynaMORE’s health-focussed strategy will promote individual well-being and reduce healthcare demands and indirect economic costs, by contributing to a healthy and productive workforce." "Beyond 1M Genomes" "Gert Matthijs" "Department of Human Genetics" "The Beyond 1 Million Genomes (B1MG) consortium will establish the support and coordination structure for the European 1+ Million Genomes initiative (1+MG), which is based upon the commitment of 20 European Member States and Norway that have signed the Declaration ‘Towards access to at least 1 million sequenced genomes in the EU by 2022’. Collectively, these countries have committed to establish a cross-border federated network of national genome collections associated with phenotypic data, consented for advancing health and medicine practices across Europe. Europe is uniquely placed to take on this challenge and position itself as a global leader in this field.B1MG will go ‘beyond’ the 1M genome target and ‘beyond’ the 20 signatory countries. The project will collaborate with an array of international initiatives and consult a range of stakeholders to support the creation of a pan-European genome-based health data infrastructure, encompassing data quality and exchange standards, access protocols and legal guidance. Recommendations will be translated to a B1MG maturity level model that provides concrete guidance on the steps required to implement personalised medicine, a healthcare approach that takes into account a person’s genetic make-up, at local, regional and national-scale.Personalised medicine is expected to bring significant socio-economic benefits, including more efficient national health systems. Faster and more accurate diagnosis, the development of pharmacogenomics and advancement of preventative medicine will lead to better health, quality of life of patients and increased life expectancy. This will be captured in a methodology for economic evaluation, forming the basis of future business-cases for implementation in the health sector."