SHAPE Congratulates Dr. MacRae and Team for Winning the $75 Million "One Brave Idea" Award to End Coronary Heart Disease

SHAPE congratulates Dr. Calum MacRae and his team at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston for winning “One Brave Idea” competition held by American Heart Association, Google’s Life Science (Verily) and Astra-Zeneca. The winner is funded $75 Million for one brave idea that could lead to the development of a cure for coronary heart disease.

SHAPE Congratulates Dr. MacRae and Team for Winning the $75 Million "One Brave Idea" Award to End Coronary Heart Disease
Houston, TX, October 06, 2016 --(PR.com)-- SHAPE, The Society for Heart Attack Prevention and Eradication (www.shapesociety.org), a nonprofit grassroots organization dedicated to the mission of eradicating heart attacks, today released a statement cheering Dr. Calum MacRae and his team at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston for winning “One Brave Idea” competition held by American Heart Association, Google’s Life Science (Verily) and Astra-Zeneca. The winner is funded $75 Million for one brave idea that could lead to the development of a cure for coronary heart disease.

“This is a great day for all involved in the fight against heart disease. On behalf of our society I would like to congratulate Dr. MacRae's team and offer our support to their project in any way we can,” said JoAnne Zawitoski, J.D. the Chairwoman of SHAPE. “Coronary heart disease manifested by heart attacks is the number one killer. It can be prevented and ultimately eradicated.”

The initiative was jointly announced by CEOs of AHA and Verily last year on November 8 during the 2015 Annual Scientific Sessions of the American Heart Association. The announcement created a cheering response by the cardiovascular research community that had never seen a $50 million award for a single idea. Google initiated the idea by offering $25M and AHA welcomed it and matched with $25M. A few weeks later, Astra-Zeneca joined the initiative and brought the award to $75M. After reviewing numerous proposals, including SHAPE’s proposal titled “Machine Learning Heart Attack Forecast System to Eliminate Heart Attacks and Detect New Targets for Drug or Vaccine Development,” this afternoon the final winner was announced live on YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPTnKzTdUj8 “One Brave Idea is an awesome initiative that will have a major impact on the timeline of ending coronary heart disease. It is a great role model for partnerships between for-profit companies and non-profit organizations working toward a noble cause such as eradicating coronary heart disease,” said Dr. Morteza Naghavi the Founder of SHAPE and Executive Chairman of the SHAPE Task Force. “We need to be reminded that unlike infectious diseases such smallpox, chickenpox, and others which are now eradicated, Coronary Heart Disease is a multi-factorial disease and requires a multi-disciplinary approach to eradication” added Dr. Naghavi.

Coronary heart disease manifested by heart attacks is the late consequence of untreated coronary atherosclerosis. It is the number one killer of both men and women. Every day over 2000 healthy-looking individuals arrive at emergency rooms with a heart attack. Had they been tested by traditional risk assessment the day before, about 70% of them would have been misclassified as low to intermediate risk. The SHAPE Task Force aimed to overhaul the status quo by developing SHAPE Guidelines which call for noninvasive detection of hidden coronary atherosclerosis using coronary calcium scoring.

About Dr. Calum MacRae

Dr. Calum Archibald MacRae is chief of cardiovascular medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) and an expert member of BWH’s Cardiovascular Genetics Program, which comprehensively evaluates, diagnoses and manages care for inherited cardiac disorder patients. In addition, he is a leading investigator at the BWH Genomics Center and an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School. He received his medical degree from University of Edinburgh College of Medicine. He completed two internal medicine residency programs: one at Wellcome Trust Centre for Neuroimaging in London and the other at BWH. He then completed a fellowship in cardiovascular disease at Massachusetts General Hospital. Dr. MacRae is board certified in internal medicine and cardiovascular disease. Dr. MacRae is a cardiologist and geneticist whose clinical interests include investigating new phenotypes and how research findings—including genomics discoveries—can be systematically implemented into clinical care. His research focuses on the biology and genomics of cardiovascular disease, specifically the biological basis of different arrhythmia susceptibilities. He holds five patents, has authored over 160 peer-reviewed publications and received research funding from the National Institutes of Health’s National Human Genome Research Institute. To learn more about Dr. MacRae visit http://physiciandirectory.brighamandwomens.org/details/565/calum-macrae-cardiovascular_medicine-boston

About One Brave Idea
Through a $75 million investment over at least five years, the American Heart Association and Verily, with support from AstraZeneca, are embarking on a groundbreaking research enterprise focused on preventing or reversing coronary heart disease and, ultimately, improving and restoring cardiovascular health. This marks the start of a bold and new chapter as the largest one-time investment in a team with a focus to end coronary heart disease. To learn more about One Brave Idea visit www.onebraveidea.com

About SHAPE
The Society for Heart Attack Prevention and Eradication (SHAPE) is a non-profit organization that promotes education and research related to prevention, detection, and treatment of heart attacks. SHAPE is committed to raising public awareness about revolutionary discoveries that are opening exciting avenues that can lead to the eradication of heart attacks. SHAPE's mission is to eradicate heart attacks in the 21st century. SHAPE has recently embarked on “Machine Learning Heart Attack Forecast System (Vulnerable Patient Project)” Project which is a collaborative effort between world’s leading cardiovascular researchers to develop a new Heart Attack Forecast System empowered by artificial intelligence. Additional information on this innovative project will be announced soon. To learn more about SHAPE visit www.shapesociety.org. Contact information: 1-877-SHAPE11 and info@shapesociety.org.

Learn more about the Vulnerable Patient http://shapesociety.org/the-first-machine-learning-heart-attack-forecast-symposium

About SHAPE Task Force
The SHAPE Task Force, an international group of leading cardiovascular physicians and researchers, has created the SHAPE Guidelines, which educates physicians on how to identify asymptomatic atherosclerosis (hidden plaques) and implement proper therapies to prevent a future heart attack. According to the SHAPE Guidelines, men 45-75 and women 55-75 need to be tested for hidden plaques in coronary or carotid arteries. Individuals with high risk atherosclerosis (high plaque score) should be treated even if their cholesterol level is within statistical “normal range.” If they have plaques, the so-called normal is not normal for them. The higher the amount of plaque burden in the arteries the higher the risk and the more vulnerable to heart attack. SHAPE Guideline aims to identify the asymptomatic “Vulnerable Patient” and offer them intensive preventive therapy to prevent a future heart attack. Knowing one's plaque score can be a matter of life and death.

The SHAPE Task Force includes the following:
Morteza Naghavi, M.D. – Executive Chairman
PK Shah, M.D. – Chair of Scientific Board
Erling Falk, M.D., Ph.D. – Chief of Editorial Committee
SHAPE Task Force Members and Advisors (alphabetic order):
Arthur Agatston, M.D., Daniel Arking, Ph.D., Juan Badimon, Ph.D., Raymond Bahr, M.D., Daniel S. Berman, M.D., Matthew J. Budoff, M.D., Jay Cohn, M.D., Michael Davidson, M.D., Raimund Erbel, M.D., Erling Falk, M.D., Ph.D., Zahi Fayad, Ph.D., Sergio Fazio, MD, PhD, Steven B. Feinstein, M.D., Craig Hartley, Ph.D., Harvey S. Hecht, M.D., Howard Hodis, M.D., Ioannis Kakadiaris, Ph.D., Sanjay Kaul, M.D., M.P.H., Asher Kimchi. M.D., Wolfgang Koenig, M.D., Ph.D., Iftikhar J. Kullo, M.D., Daniel Lane, M.D., Ph.D., David Maron, M.D., Roxana Mehran, M.D., Ralph Metcalfe, Ph.D., Morteza Naghavi, M.D., Khurram Nasir, M.D., M.P.H., Tasneem Z. Naqvi, M.D., Jagat Narula, M.D., Paolo Raggi, M.D., George P. Rodgers, M.D., James HF Rudd, Ph.D., John A. Rumberger, PhD, M.D., Robert S. Schwartz, M.D., PK Shah, M.D., Leslee Shaw, Ph.D., David Spence, M.D., H. Robert Superko, M.D., Henrik Sillesen, M.D., Ph.D., Pierre-Jean Touboul, M.D. Nathan D. Wong, Ph.D.
Distinguished SHAPE Task Force Advisor: Valentin Fuster, M.D., Ph.D.
Chair of SHAPE Board of Directors: JoAnne Zawitoski, J.D.
Vice Chair and Executive Board Member: Brenda Garrett Superko, CVRN
SHAPE Task Force Public Relations: Daniel Keeney
Contact
SHAPE (Society for Heart Attack Prevention and Eradication)
JoAnne Zawitoski, J.D.
1-877-SHAPE11
www.shapesociety.org
info@shapesoiety.org
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