Abstract

The First Cytomic Signature of Vascular Health

Roy Overton, VP, Laboratory Operations, CytoVas, LLC

By 2030 it is predicted that over 40% of adults in the U.S. (approximately 116 million people) will have one or more forms of CVD1.  Presently, there is no biomarker reflective of vascular function that is clinically available and predictive of cardiovascular events.  Therefore, a precision medicine approach, involving measurement of targets directly related to the pathology, is needed to address this unmet clinical need with a diagnostic test that provides a measure of cardiovascular health and an assessment of the efficacy of therapeutic interventions.  The CytoVas Vascular Health Profile™ (VHP) uses flow cytometry to measure a broad panel of mature and progenitor endothelial cells, subsets of T-cells, and cell-specific extracellular vesicles (EVs) in the blood2.  EVs are derived from populations involved in the disease process and from arterial endothelium as it becomes increasingly inflamed and vulnerable to rupture. In comparison to other standard-of-care tests, the VHP’s sensitivity and specificity in predicting heart attack and stroke demonstrate significant improvements in accuracy.  The VHP is the first-in-class diagnostic and prognostic test, integrating cytomic data3 via Cytometric Fingerprinting™ to provide a highly precise, cell-based signature of the state of the endothelium and, by extension, vascular health.