Perinatal, cardiovascular and sleep-related diseases are a major health problem, and are on the rise. Detecting these diseases at an early stage is critical to halt this rise, to prevent comorbidities, and to lower healthcare costs while simultaneously improving patient quality of life.
The PICASSO project proposed here seeks to leverage technological advances in pathophysiological modeling, unobtrusive sensing, monitoring and data analysis to enable earlier recognition, mitigate progression and improve treatment of perinatal, cardiovascular and sleep-related diseases. The project covers two perinatal diseases (gestational diabetes mellitus, pregnancy-induced hypertensive disorders), multiple cardiovascular diseases (cardiac arrhythmias, coronary artery disease mitral valve disease), and two sleep-related diseases (obstructive sleep apnea, insomnia). Cardiorespiratory risk factors are a common denominator of most of these diseases and accordingly technologies for assessment of these risk factors figure prominently throughout the project.
The general approach in PICASSO is to co-develop novel technological solutions in a controlled clinical environment, and to subsequently refine and validate them in extramural and at-home settings, immediately followed by deployment in the healthcare system with the aim to increase effectiveness at lower costs in combination with lower patient burden and higher patient quality of life.