BREATHE

A revolutionary solution to prevent respiratory attacks.

The challenge

Chronic Obstructive Airway Diseases (COAD), including asthma and Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD), affect over 106 million people in Europe and more than 668 million worldwide, making it one of the leading causes of disability, health resource utilisation and poor quality of life [1].

These diseases are complex and vary greatly between patients, making treatment challenging. However, they share two key issues:

  1. Frequent flare-ups (exacerbations): Sudden worsening of symptoms that can often be prevented by spotting early warning signs, understanding individual triggers, and acting quickly.
  2. Airway inflammation: The main underlying process that drives these flare-ups.

Every day, 1 million people suffer a respiratory attack. Almost half of COAD patients [1] experience at least one attack per year [2], and 20% of these lead to hospitalisations [3] [4]. These attacks not only pose a life-threatening risk but also significantly reduce the patient’s quality of life and burden families with emotional and financial stress.

Respiratory attacks are one of the biggest drivers of lung function decline, leading to long-term health problems. They are also a huge strain on healthcare budgets, making up 80% of COAD-related costs in Europe—equivalent to €66.24 billion annually—due to emergency care and hospitalisations [1].

The risk of these attacks varies for each individual, influenced by factors like lung health, lifestyle, environmental triggers, and socioeconomic conditions. The more untreated factors a person has, the higher their risk of an attack. While some of these factors are assessed during doctor visits, there are no effective tools to monitor airway inflammation outside of healthcare settings, meaning many opportunities to prevent respiratory attacks are missed.

This gap in care is one of the biggest challenges in managing COAD today.

The solution

Evernoa is a unique digital medical device designed to prevent exacerbations in COAD. It collects real-world data to estimate an exacerbation risk indicator and provides actionable feedback to address and reduce the identified risks.

The solution operates in three simple steps:

  • Data collection: Patient data is gathered.
  • Risk calculation: AI analyses the data to calculate the risk of an exacerbation, identifying specific individual risk factors.
  • Actionable feedback: Results are shared with both the clinician and the patient, enabling personalised, patient-centered interventions to reduce the risk of exacerbation.

One of Evernoa’s biggest strengths is its ability to integrate smoothly into existing clinical workflows. There are already well-defined guidelines and processes for managing COAD patients at higher risk of exacerbation or those with identified risk factors. Evernoa enhances these workflows by providing complementary, high-value insights without disrupting the current practices. Evernoa supports integration into hospital information systems (HIS) or IT systems in private practices.

By using Evernoa under medical prescription, clinicians can personalise patient management through a holistic analysis of the patient’s environment, enabling data-driven clinical decisions. This empowers patients to take control of their condition and engage actively in their care.

Evernoa’s ability to provide personalised, actionable insights while fitting seamlessly into existing healthcare workflows makes it a transformative tool for COAD management. By leveraging real-world data and AI, it empowers clinicians to make informed decisions, reduces the risk of exacerbations, and engages patients in taking control of their health.

Expected impact

The BREATHE consortium estimates that just three years after the completion of the project, more than 208,338 patients will be reached preventing 37,248 attacks and reducing hospitalisations by 25,263.  The estimated cost savings for participating health regions will be over €113M.

BREATHE will contribute to reducing the number of exacerbations by 55.45% and the severity of exacerbations requiring emergency care by 43.33%. Most severe exacerbations requiring hospitalisation will also be reduced by 93.33% saving 8B€.

Apart from that, Evernoa will free healthcare resources, contributing to the sustainability of health systems: 1.2 million fewer hospitalisations, 2.8 million fewer emergency department visits and 3.8 million fewer primary care visits due to exacerbations. With the average length of hospital stay for a chronic respiratory disease (CRD) exacerbation being 6.98 days, this equates to 8 million hospital bed days freed, easing strain on hospitals.

Patients will enjoy greater participation in daily life activities, leading to tangible societal gains. It has been estimated that at the EU level, the use of the Evernoa system would allow 425 million working hours to be recovered. In the case of the student age population (between 5 and 16 years old), the reduction of exacerbations would be translated into 173 million hours of study time that CRD patients would not lose.

External Partners
  • Eversens (Activity Leader)
References

[1] Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2011 https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/hus/hus11.pdf

[2] Assessing Adherence by Combining the Test of Adherence to Inhalers With Pharmacy Refill Records, Plaza, et al., 2021 https://docusalut.com/handle/20.500.13003/19447

[3] Kavanagh J, Jackson DJ, Kent BD. Over- and under-diagnosis in asthma. Breathe (Sheff). 2019 Mar;15(1):e20-e27. doi: 10.1183/20734735.0362-2018. PMID: 31031841; PMCID: PMC6481983.

[4] Miravitlles M, Peña-Longobardo LM, Oliva-Moreno J, Hidalgo-Vega Á. Caregivers’ burden in patients with COPD. Int J Chron Obstruct Pulmon Dis. 2015 Feb 12;10:347-56. doi: 10.2147/COPD.S76091. PMID: 25709429; PMCID: PMC4334315.

Leyre Ruete
| CEO | Eversens
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