Key takeaways   

- Depression affects 300+ million people and increases the risk of cardiovascular disease (CVD) and mortality by two to three times.

- One in three CVD patients experiences depression; one in two develops it after major cardiac events.

- The conditions are usually managed separately, but EU-ESC multi-partner project TO_AITION bridges long-standing gap between cardiovascular disease and mental health management.

- Project has created tools including a cloud-based, web-accessible risk stratification platform for diagnosis, prognosis, and treatment support.

Brussels, 13 October 2025: Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the leading cause of death worldwide, with 10.2 million people falling ill with CVD every year across Europe. Within the ESC member countries, CVD has remained the most common cause of death with over 3 million deaths every year including over 1.6 million deaths in women and 1.5 million deaths in men [1]. Depression affects over 300 million people globally and increases CVD risk and mortality by two to three times. One in three CVD patients experiences depression; one in two develops it after major cardiac events. [2] 

The European Union-funded TO_AITION project, set for completion in late 2025, is investigating the biological causes of inflammation linking CVD and depression, and is using a wide range of biological and analytical techniques, including AI, to identify common causative mechanisms and biomarkers, as well as contribute to new diagnostic and predictive tools supporting prevention, prognosis, and therapy. The project is integrating advanced research and technology to bridge the gap between cardiovascular and mental health, aligning with the global message of holistic healthcare promoted on World Mental Health Day (10 October).

Dr Kalliopi Thanopoulou, TO_AITION Work Package leader on Dissemination, Exploitation and Awareness activities and Director of EXELIXIS, Athens, Greece, says: “World Mental Health Day emphasises the need to treat mental and physical health as equally important. TO_AITION has advanced understanding of how immune and metabolic factors connect the heart and the brain, shows that mental and physical health are inseparable, and progress in one depends on understanding the other.” 

One of the successes of the project so far is the demonstration of the TO_AITION cloud risk stratification platform during ESC Congress 2025 in Madrid, demonstrated by Dr Antonis Sakellarios from partner institution the University of Ioannina, Greece [3]. It is a web-accessible risk stratification platform for diagnosis, prognosis, and treatment support of CVD/depression comorbidity. It is designed for use by caregivers, cardiologists, psychiatrists, mental health physicians, and industry partners. 

Beyond this cloud risk-stratification demo, TO_AITION has delivered integrative analyses that map shared markers and pathways across depression and cardiovascular disease, revealing synergistic disease-network associations linked to multimorbidity. It has also helped identify common pathways and candidate causal molecules underpinning co-/multimorbidity; a lab-on-chip (microfluidic) prototype enabling rapid, non-invasive readouts of key biomarkers implicated in both conditions; and new preclinical models specifically designed to probe depression–CVD comorbidity. The project concludes in December 2025. 

ENDS

This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 848146.