GSS EU Science Funding Gateway

The action generated by this topic should pave the way towards transforming the current isolated research efforts and static late-stage development approaches into a more patient-centred and simplified (more inclusive/enriched patient population, shorter study duration, potential enablement of the evaluation of preventive or early therapeutic strategies based on predicted outcomes, cost-effectiveness etc.) as well as sustainable part of clinical research and development. This aim is supported by increasing the insights into OA as an heterogenous disease with various underlying patient risk profiles, patho-mechanistic pathways and underlying genotypic/epigenetic/ metabolomic/transcriptomic phenomena based on big data. Such insights will allow for the creation of integrated risk profiles combining clinical and multi-omic approaches (e.g. clinical characteristics, transcriptomics, proteomics, genetic markers, and in-depth multimodal imaging data).

These advances are needed to support the development of patient-relevant and cost-efficient integrated health care solutions including focused, individualised treatments for specific patient segments. The use of AI-based approaches is crucial for the integration of the totality of existing patient datasets and mechanistic disease insights to better understand disease drivers in various tissues of joints thereby upscaling, broadening and/or sharpening current methodology.

The proposed action must:

• gather and provide access to high quality data – including clinical data from trials (mainly data from placebo arms from studies run outside the project) provided by the pre-identified industry consortium and by applicants as well as prospective observational data, registry data and cohort data including genetic, imaging, soluble biomarker, and data from wearables among others;
• provide a flexible federated data lake house with appropriate tools for access, management and governance, data curation, integration, and augmentation for consequent high-performance analytics using for example new or contributed AI (foundation) models and modelling workflows. This infrastructure will deploy existing or newly developed approaches or implementations to host and analyse disparate data assets ranging from public, commercial, and not-for-profit observational and trial clinical data to -omics, images, or data from wearables. In their proposal applicants should address key challenges around federated data collection, data privacy, data transfer, data storage, data processing, curation, and harmonisation of data, etc. to achieve a comprehensive understanding of OA by upscaled, big data analytics from:
• genetic analyses (GWAS);
• AI-driven big data analyses for identification of clinical patterns in phenotypes and endotypes;
• algorithm-based imaging analyses of whole joints and peri-articular tissues;
• the evaluation of performance assessments using novel technologies and devices.
• generate and provide a validation strategy for a risk model of disease progression by evaluating whether and to which extent risk factors and predictive models identified in the literature and the above-mentioned data sets are reliably predictive for the progression of structural joint changes as evidenced by imaging, pain and functional decline documented by patients and ultimately leading to joint replacement surgery. The combination of surrogate markers such as imaging with medical history and medication, as well as with predictive markers (plasma-based multi-omics, polygenic risk scores), patient reported outcome data and data from wearables or performance tests, will generate a more refined predictive engine in analogy to, for example, established fracture risk prediction algorithms in osteoporosis;
• work towards a broad consensus between all stakeholders especially linking patients, caregivers and healthcare providers’ perspectives to regulatory and health technology assessment (HTA) bodies. This will enable the elaboration of a set of endpoints relevant to these groups depending on the phase of development of treatments (i.e. early phase trials for medication or device efficacy, while late-stage development needs to prove effectiveness, which may necessitate different sets of outcomes), incorporating the various domains of assessments, and taking into account the predominant effect (structural or symptomatic) of the evaluated treatment. This will help to shape new regulatory frameworks for accelerated targeted OA treatment development based on big data analyses, in-silico trials, digital twin approaches and similar innovative trial designs;
• use data analysis and modelling to provide evidence and knowledge that could enable the evaluation of existing innovative tools (such as functional assessments, imaging approaches etc.) and innovative treatment solutions for OA, based on their scientific validity and feasibility as a prerequisite. Design a strategy to progress them towards regulatory validation and implementation. The action should provide an exploratory and interactive platform to evaluate the validity and user-preference of novel methods of evidence generation, such as the use of data from wearable devices, innovative imaging, and surrogate markers for joint replacement surgery;
• model short- and long-term economic and public health impact from OA including morbidity and mortality. These new risk models should support benefit/risk assessment as well as quality and efficacy assessments of therapeutic interventions in patients diagnosed with OA to prevent or delay the onset of disease progression, but also avoid overtreatment and thereby optimise the use of health care resources;
• develop a decision tool based on predictive models that can support shared decision-making between physicians, patients and their caregivers to select the intervention best suited to address the various stages and symptoms of OA in an individual patient, integrating also patient reported outcome and experience measure (PROMs and PREMs) data as well as patient preferences. The diversity of patients at risk or affected by the disease must be considered when discussing patient-relevant outcomes to enable the focused development of treatments and healthcare solutions specific to the needs of individual patients;
• leverage real-world evidence (RWE) data to address the diversity of patients including sex and gender, ethnicity, and race disparities to develop patient engagement strategies. This should enable engagement with specific groups for the design of OA outcome trials and better promotion of OA management.

The action should contribute to addressing the research needs outlined in the Regulatory Science Research Needs initiative, launched by the European Medicines Agency (EMA), assessing the utility of real-world healthcare data to improve the quality of randomised controlled trial simulations and patient and public involvement and engagement.