New study will use artificial intelligence to improve treatments for people with multiple long-term conditions

The NIHR has awarded £2.5 million for new research led by the University of Birmingham that will use artificial intelligence (AI) to produce computer programmes and tools that will help doctors improve the choice of drugs in patients with clusters of multiple long-term conditions. Called the OPTIMAL study (OPTIMising therapies, discovering therapeutic targets and AI assisted clinical management for patients Living with complex multimorbidity), the research aims to understand how different combinations of long-term conditions and the medicines taken for these diseases interact over time to worsen or improve a patient's health. The study will be led by Dr Thomas Jackson and Professor Krish Nirantharakumar at the University of Birmingham and carried out in collaboration with the University of Manchester, University Hospitals Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust, NHS Greater Glasgow & Clyde, University of St Andrews,and the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency. An estimated 14 million people in England are living with two or more long-term conditions, with two-thirds of adults aged over 65 expected to be living with multiple long-term conditions by 2035. Dr Thomas Jackson, Associate Professor in Geriatric Medicine at the University of Birmingham, said: "Currently when people have multiple long-term conditions, we treat each disease separately. This means we prescribe a different drug for each condition, which may not help people with complex multimorbidity which is a term we use when patients have four or more long-term health problem. "A drug for one disease can make another disease worse or better, however, presently we do not have information on the effect of one drug on a second disease.