Dive Brief:

• Medtronic and Tempus have begun a study to assess the use of artificial intelligence to identify patients with symptomatic severe aortic stenosis, the companies said last week.
• The randomized trial will use Tempus’ platform to find patients who are eligible for interventions such as transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) but do not have a treatment plan in place. The study is funded by Medtronic and sponsored by Tempus.
• Identifying patients could address the undertreatment of symptomatic severe aortic stenosis, which can be fatal, and tackle racial, ethnic, gender and geographic disparities in access to care.

Dive Insight:

Medtronic said in the announcement that data suggest white patients account for 91% of TAVR procedures and patients who are Black, Hispanic, Asian or part of other racial groups are not being treated with the minimally invasive heart procedure at the same rate. The company, which sells TAVR devices, added that the procedure can shorten hospital stays and reduce recovery times compared to open-heart surgery. 

Tempus has developed its Next platform to identify and minimize care gaps for oncology and cardiology patients. In cardiology, the platform applies more than 60 algorithms to multimodal data to find at-risk patients. The platform notifies care teams when follow-up is needed or a patient is at risk of progressing. 

The company has developed an algorithm to predict atrial fibrillation and said in June that it was working on algorithms to predict aortic stenosis.

The randomized trial with Medtronic will use the Next platform to identify severe aortic stenosis or moderate to severe mitral regurgitation patients who are not being treated despite meeting guideline indicated therapy criteria.

Medtronic’s collaboration with Tempus is part of a broader push into AI. Medtronic CEO Geoff Martha discussed the company’s approach to AI at a Wells Fargo conference in September, explaining how the company began around four years ago by holding a Shark Tank-type event that allowed its businesses to pitch for funding for AI ideas. 

Since then, Medtronic has begun to centralize aspects of its AI strategy “so each business doesn't have to build the platform by themselves,” Martha said. Medtronic is creating platforms at an enterprise level that the company’s different businesses can use.