Watson Analytics to Research Heart Rhythm Data

The Cardiac Arrhythmia Network of Canada (CANet) is accelerating their research with Heart-SIGN, a platform designed with IBM’s Watson Analytics and BigInsights on Cloud at its core.

Exciting innovation: @IBM & @CANet_nce help boost heart research with a new #analytics platform called, #HeartSIGN https://t.co/hgWZwOMQAF pic.twitter.com/9ZEnxGFF7q

— Michelle Zulauf (@ZulaufMichelle) October 21, 2016

As neuroscientists working on treatments for Parkinson’s Disease can attest, today’s healthcare researchers are inundated with massive amounts of big data. Heart-SIGN’s ability to synthesize CANet’s findings could reveal discoveries in the field that may have otherwise taken years.

Who CANet Is

CANet is a young network. The federal government committed $26.3 million in December 2014 to set it up as one of Canada’s Networks of Centres of Excellence, hosted at Western University’s Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry in London, Ontario. Dr. Anthony Tang was named its Scientific Director and CEO.

Networks funded under the federal Networks of Centres of Excellence program were designed to link researchers at universities with hospitals, companies and government, so findings could move more quickly into practice. CANet was built on that model.

The network was designed to bring together more than 100 investigators from across the country, working on conditions such as fainting (syncope), atrial fibrillation and sudden cardiac death. That’s exactly why a shared data platform matters: when research is spread across many universities and hospitals, the data ends up spread across them too.

How Heart-SIGN Works

Heart-SIGN stands for System for Information Gathering and Networking. According to IBM’s description of the project, it manages, monitors, stores and correlates data from CANet’s research projects, using BigInsights on Cloud and Watson Analytics as a shared data resource for arrhythmia research and clinical practice.

In practice, that splits the work in two. BigInsights handles storing and processing large volumes of data in the cloud, while Watson Analytics gives researchers a way to explore that data and spot patterns without having to write their own analysis code.

Nathalie Le Prohon, Vice President at IBM Watson Health Life Sciences, says: “The ability for researchers and providers to utilize cognitive tools helps them to spend less time sifting through data and more time gaining insights and delivering transformation where we need it most.”

Excited to partner with @IBMCanada on #HeartSIGN. Helping researchers find answers faster. #arrhythmiaresearch… https://t.co/do3WxqpycU pic.twitter.com/59aPSr3tj7

— Nathalie Le Prohon (@NathLePro) October 21, 2016

Why Arrhythmia Research Matters

Millions of Canadians experience some form of arrhythmia, or irregular heartbeats, a condition that can negatively impact productivity and overall quality of life. In some cases, arrhythmia can also lead to sudden cardiac death, resulting in the loss of 40,000 lives a year.

An arrhythmia is a problem with the electrical signals that keep the heart beating in a steady rhythm. The heart may beat too fast, too slowly or irregularly. Some arrhythmias are harmless, while others raise the risk of stroke or can stop the heart from pumping effectively. Because symptoms come and go, and because the same condition can look very different from patient to patient, large pools of data are one of the best tools researchers have for understanding who is most at risk.

What Happened Next

CANet kept growing after this announcement. In 2018, CANet and its partners announced 10 research grants worth more than $4.4 million, with a further $10 million in matching funds.

The network later became the Cardiovascular Network of Canada. Government records list it as funded from 2014 to 2024, and note that it developed VIRTUES, a cloud-based, secure virtual care platform for patients. That’s a natural next step from Heart-SIGN: from pooling research data in the cloud to delivering care through it.

IBM’s health business went in a different direction. In January 2022, IBM agreed to sell the data and analytics assets of Watson Health to private equity firm Francisco Partners. The deal closed later that year and the business became a standalone company called Merative. IBM kept its core Watson AI technology and said the sale would let it focus on hybrid cloud and AI.

The Bigger Lesson

The story of Heart-SIGN is a useful reminder about where the real value in health tech sits. Brand names and platforms change, but the data researchers gather, and the networks that make sharing it possible, tend to outlast them. For research groups, that’s an argument for owning your data and keeping it portable, whatever tools you use to analyze it.