Qureight Model Shows Promise for Pulmonary Vascular Disease Management
Peer-reviewed study confirms the Vascul8™ model’s ability to improve patient care and reduce the need for invasive procedures following surgery for chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension.
Qureight, a Cambridge-based techbio company focused on improving understanding of lung and heart disease through advanced imaging and data analysis, has announced the validation of its Vascul8™ model for pulmonary vascular disorders. The findings were published in the American Journal of Respiratory Cell and Molecular Biology and represent an important expansion of Qureight’s imaging platform into new areas of severe respiratory disease.
The study demonstrated that the Vascul8 model delivers accurate, automated insights into patient outcomes following pulmonary endarterectomy (PEA), a complex surgical procedure performed to remove chronic blood clots in the lungs caused by chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension (CTEPH). The model successfully identified patients at high risk of residual pulmonary hypertension after surgery, reducing the need for routine right heart catheterisation, an invasive and resource-intensive diagnostic procedure.
CTEPH is a rare but serious condition in which blood clots obstruct the arteries of the lungs, leading to increased pressure on the heart. Although PEA surgery can be curative, some patients continue to experience pulmonary hypertension and require further treatment. Traditionally, right heart catheterisation has been used to identify those patients, but the new findings suggest that Vascul8 can provide the same insight non-invasively through analysis of standard CT pulmonary angiograms (CTPAs).
Joanna Pepke-Zaba, Consultant Physician, Royal Papworth Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, Associate Professor, University of Cambridge, and lead author of the paper, said
“CTEPH has for a long time had a complex disease management pathway, requiring the subjective expertise of multidisciplinary teams. We are excited to have worked on this study where we show an alternative approach to imaging CTEPH and patient management, employing Qureight’s imaging analysis model, Vascul8. This signals a major step forward in deploying imaging in severe and complex respiratory and vascular diseases.”
Using advanced image analysis, the Vascul8 model was able to quantify changes in blood vessel volume in patients following surgery, including differentiation between arterial and venous blood flow. This precise segmentation allowed researchers to assess vascular remodelling and disease severity, providing clinicians with a reliable method to track post-operative recovery and determine which patients might benefit from further intervention.
Hakim Ghani, Research Fellow, Royal Papworth Hospital NHS Foundation Trust and first author of the paper, added:
“Powered by Vascul8, automated quantification of lung blood volumes from CT scans can help identify patients with chronic blood clots who remain at risk of residual pulmonary hypertension after surgery. This AI-driven imaging approach could guide better treatment decisions, support more personalised care, reduce the need for invasive tests, and enable new endpoints in clinical trials - overall offering huge potential for patient benefit.”
Simon Walsh, CSO, Qureight, and co-author of the paper, commented:
“This study shows the promise of our deep-learning vascular biomarkers and demonstrates that our imaging platform can be used beyond fibrotic lung disease, in pulmonary vascular disorders such as CTEPH. This breakthrough establishes the foundation for future biopharma partnerships in pulmonary vascular disease, reinforcing our leadership position in regulatory-grade, disease-agnostic imaging biomarkers built for clinical and translational research, to accelerate drug development, enable smarter patient selection, and support precision medicine.”
The validation of Qureight’s Vascul8 model represents an important step in advancing precision care for patients with severe respiratory and cardiovascular disease. By providing clinicians with quantitative, non-invasive insights into vascular health, the technology has the potential to transform how complex pulmonary conditions are monitored and treated. Qureight continues to collaborate with clinical and research partners to expand the application of its platform across multiple disease areas and support the development of new, data-driven approaches to patient care.
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BioFocus Newsroom