AI study shows GLP-1s could help prevent heart disease in millions

Dandelion Health, a clinical AI and real-world data (RWD) platform focused on precision medicine, has revealed findings suggesting that GLP-1 medications could serve as primary prevention for cardiovascular disease in 44 million additional at-risk patients who have not been studied in clinical trials until now. This study utilized Dandelion's new Clinical AI Marketplace, officially launched today.

The Clinical AI Marketplace offers life sciences organizations the opportunity to conduct novel research far more rapidly and comprehensively than traditional methods allow. It integrates validated AI from a growing ecosystem of clinical developers and runs it against Dandelion's robust RWD, which includes diverse multimodal data sources such as medical images and raw clinical notes. This capability enables the marketplace to unlock otherwise inaccessible unstructured data, shedding light on critical insights like treatment discontinuation reasons and in-depth changes from new treatments.

Shivaani Prakash, head of data at Dandelion Health, said: "By combining diverse, multimodal data with validated AI, life sciences companies and researchers can now study treatment effects on a far larger, more representative population — and do so at a fraction of the cost and time."

The study explored whether GLP-1s could prevent heart attacks and strokes in individuals without severe preexisting CVD — a group not typically included in trials like Novo Nordisk's SELECT study. Dandelion analyzed data using an AI-biomarker algorithm from Pheiron that predicts the risk of major adverse cardiovascular events (MACE) from ECG waveforms collected in routine care. This algorithm was validated through Dandelion’s public service to ensure accuracy and unbiased results.

In just six weeks and at less than 1% of the time and cost of a clinical trial, Dandelion’s study found that GLP-1s could reduce MACE risk by 15-20% after three years for patients without prior CVD events. This broader application of GLP-1s could prevent an estimated 34,000 heart attacks and strokes annually in the U.S. if these 44 million patients were to take the medication.

Elliott Green, co-founder and CEO of Dandelion Health, highlighted the implications, he said: "The cost and time associated with drug development and commercialization are substantial, but the impact of providing the right treatment to the right patient, and doing so with unprecedented speed, is immeasurable."

Dandelion’s research demonstrates how AI and RWD can significantly de-risk clinical trials, enable head-to-head drug comparisons, and support market access and reimbursement decisions. These insights can help providers intervene earlier, reducing adverse health outcomes for millions.