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The STRAP consortium aims to reduce the burden of heart disease by early detecting heart disease deterioration, benefiting patients, healthcare workers, and society. This initiative responds to acute needs observed in cardiology clinics, combined with the increasing availability of health tracking technologies. The project focuses on developing a new, AI-powered solution using cost-effective technology to maximize impact on healthcare costs. The Research STRAP is dedicated to developing a comprehensive data collection platform integrating off-the-shelf and cutting-edge self-tracking technologies. This platform empowers patients to measure vital signs at home, eliminating the need for frequent clinic visits and enabling longitudinal data collection on daily activities and emotions. The platform enhances self-tracking adherence through gamification strategies. The project involves developing and evaluating novel diagnostic and prognostic methods through two trials with target groups where notable improvements are achievable and highly impactful: Trial for Elderly Heart Patients: reducing re-hospitalization among elderly heart patients to minimize health deterioration and healthcare costs. Trial at Cardiac Outpatient Clinics: lower costs and enhance the quality of heart disease diagnosis for individuals attending cardiac outpatient clinics. The foundation of the trials is twofold. Establishing a Robust Dataset: creating an interconnected dataset to evaluate digitalized techniques' performance in relation to health records. This dataset incorporates electrocardiography data, stethoscope audio recordings, wrist-worn device activity levels, electronic nose sensor data, and self-reported information via IoT technologies, including parameters like water consumption, sleep patterns, real-time feelings, physiological responses, and overall patient well-being. Employing this diverse dataset, STRAP develops innovative analysis and early diagnosis methods to advance heart disease detection and monitoring. Through these efforts, STRAP aims to implement advanced technologies and data-driven approaches to significantly impact heart disease management. Origin This project was funded within the Big Data & Health Program. The focus of this public-private research program is the use of big data for the early detection and prevention of cardiovascular diseases. The program has been developed by NWO, ZonMw, the Dutch Heart Foundation, the Top Sectors Life Sciences & Health (LSH), ICT and Creative Industry, the Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport, and the Netherlands eScience Center. Within this research program, the ambitions of the Dutch Heart Foundation, the Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport, and the Netherlands eScience Center were aligned with the ambitions of Commit2Data for the Top Sectors ICT, LSH, and Creative Industry, as described in the 2018-2019 Kennis- en Innovatiecontracts between NWO and the Top Sectors.

About 10% of the COVID-19 affected patients develop critical illness with a high mortality rate. This critical illness appears to be strongly linked with cardiovascular disease, as the prevalence of cardiovascular comorbidities and risk factors (such as diabetes and obesity) are often found among hospitalized COVID-19 patients. The consortium COVID@Heart believes that mitigating this cardiovascular burden of Covid-19 should start early, while patients are (still) outside the hospital. The Research COVID@Heart has three core activities: Develop a tool to identify high-risk cardiovascular patients with COVID-19 in a home environment, before the critical illness emerges. This tool will allow general practitioners to better notify high-risk patients, monitor them more closely (e.g. by using home saturation measurements), prescribe preventive cardiovascular medication earlier ('moon shot') and refer them to a hospital promptly when needed. Create a diagnostic tool to improve early differentiation between COVID-19 and a myocardial infarction, addressing the challenge of overlapping symptoms faced by general practitioners. Design a questionnaire supplemented by select biomarkers and blood tests to enhance the detection of cardiovascular disease in COVID-19 survivors experiencing prolonged symptoms of fatigue and shortness of breath, as these symptoms are potentially linked to accelerated subclinical cardiovascular disease. Origin Accurate information on how cardiovascular patients fared while still at home is lacking. This information is crucial to prevent hospital admissions. Therefore, COVID@HEART focuses on people who are not hospitalized but are at home and treated by their general practitioners. The Dutch Heart Foundation supports and funds this research into the best treatment for cardiovascular patients with a coronavirus infection.