Cavadis, based in the Netherlands, is a biomedical company focused on discovering novel imaging biomarkers, developing molecular diagnostics and identifying therapeutic targets for atherosclerotic disease.

Our aim is to identify the patient at risk for myocardial infarction and stroke due to vulnerable plaque.

Atherosclerosis is a slow process that can evolve over decades before becoming manifest. It involves plaque formation and a subsequent narrowing of the lumen of arteries throughout the body. Many patients develop "vulnerable plaques" that can finally lead to sudden events such as myocardial infarction and stroke.

Effective interventions like Coronary Artery Bypass Grafting (CABG) and Percutaneous Coronary Intervention (PCI) are available; however re-stenosis often occurs remaining the single most important drawback. The major challenge is to identify patients that are at risk for further progression of atherosclerotic disease and prone to developing re-stenosis.

Developing diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers (imaging, plaque detection and serology) that allow identification and risk-stratification of patients (secondary prevention) is of great value for subsequent treatment strategies and drug development programs.

Cavadis holds a unique position compared to its competitors. The company has the exclusive right to license the jointly developed knowledge from a collaborative research program with UMC Utrecht (The Netherlands) regarding established relationships between plaque protein expression patterns and clinical outcome during follow-up. This set of scientific data is derived data from the Athero-Express, a biobank study which contains more than 1,600 well-characterized atherosclerotic plaques with associated clinical information including 3-year follow-up data. Such biobank is without comparison. Together with a state of the art bioinformatics approach, this in-depth knowledge of plaque protein expression and clinical outcome will provide Cavadis with essential insight into the natural history of the disease and to the genes and proteins that are expressed within plaques that are related with future adverse clinical syndromes.

This innovative concept of Cavadis biomarker search leads to a breakthrough in clinically applicable diagnostic testing and improvement of patient healthcare.