Atman Health Receives ARPA-H Grant for AI Heart Failure System

Atman Health, a Boston-based company, has been awarded a grant from the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H) to develop an agentic artificial intelligence (AI) system for cardiovascular care, starting with heart failure. The initiative, part of ARPA-H's ADVOCATE program, aims to modernize the management of chronic cardiovascular diseases in the United States.

Heart failure affects approximately 7.7 million Americans, a condition that requires a gradual introduction and adjustment of four classes of medication. The regimen, while proven, often fails to reach its full potential due to the lack of repeated specialist contact and the shortage of cardiologists. According to a 2024 analysis in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, 1,454 of the 3,143 counties in the United States have no practicing cardiologist, exacerbating the issue.

Atman Health's approach is to create an AI system that can continuously provide the necessary clinical support without requiring regular visits to a cardiologist. The system, led by Rahul Deo, MD, PhD, co-founder, chief product officer, and chief medical officer, and Rahul Patel, co-founder, chief executive officer, and chief technology officer, will use a combination of large language models for data interpretation and patient conversations, and a deterministic engine for making rigorous clinical decisions.

The deterministic engine, built on over 9,000 explicit clinical criteria, 9,600 medication and indication pairings, 6,900 titration profiles, and more than 100 symptom triage flows, ensures that every clinical decision is traceable and transparent. The system will undergo a single-center shadow-mode study before proceeding to a pre-submission engagement with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), an Investigational Device Exemption application, and a De Novo submission targeted within 24 months.

"We are excited to receive this funding from ARPA-H," said Rahul Deo. "Our goal is to provide the same level of care to patients in rural areas as they would receive in leading academic medical centers. This system will enable us to make these decisions autonomously, ensuring that patients receive the correct medication at the right time, even when a cardiologist is not available."

Atman Health, founded by Deo, Patel, and others, is reimagining cardiovascular care with AI and automation. The company's platform pairs large language models for data interpretation and patient conversations with a transparent, deterministic decision engine. Khosla Ventures and iSelect Fund are among the investors backing Atman Health.

The project, funded by ARPA-H, marks a significant step towards addressing the critical gaps in cardiovascular care, particularly in underserved regions. By automating the decision-making process, Atman Health aims to improve patient outcomes and reduce the burden on healthcare professionals.