Coral Partners with DrugViu to Address Minority Representation in Autoimmune Precision Medicine Initiative


Coral and Drugviu Logos

Coral and Drugviu Logos

Our organizations have a shared belief that precision medicine efforts should lead to targeted therapeutic interventions for specific patient subpopulations, but also be inclusive in its applicability across gender and ethnicity.

Coral, a San Francisco biotech developing new clinical tests to improve medication selection and market access for autoimmune patients has partnered with DrugViu, a healthcare technology company that helps patients with autoimmune diseases get full control and consolidate their medical records to find better treatment options, participate in clinical trials and track their contributions to research.

Coral Genomics will utilize the DrugViu platform to develop clinical companion diagnostics for inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) among African American and other minority patients. The patient study will begin with 100 patient pilot and expand to over 1,000 in the next two years in order to help fill the void in existing clinical data, in which samples of white Americans greatly outnumber that of minority populations, who represent only 6% of medical research participants, according to DrugViu. Initial results will be available by the summer of 2021, but will continue for two full years to increase enrollment and the quality of data collected.

This study extends Coral’s existing research focus for autoimmune conditions. Traditionally thought to mainly impact people of European descent, IBD is now recognized as increasingly common among minorities, despite the current lack of companion diagnostics available for this segment of the population. IBD is a chronic disease that includes Crohn’s disease or ulcerative colitis and affects 3 million American adults, according to the Center for Disease Control.

“We’re excited to be able to work with DrugViu towards improving outcomes for diverse IBD patients. Our organizations have a shared belief that precision medicine efforts should lead to targeted therapeutic interventions for specific patient subpopulations, but also be inclusive in its applicability across gender and ethnicity. In particular, we’re interested in seeing if we can cross-validate our discovery of a novel subpopulation of patients that don’t appear to respond to any existing therapies on the market in this cohort.” said Coral’s CEO Atray Dixit, PhD. Coral’s study will be performed in collaboration with academic medical centers, gastroenterologists, and DrugViu to improve the enrollment of minority patients.

“As a health data equity company with a focus on IBD and other autoimmune diseases in general, Drugviu is excited to work with Coral towards building a more inclusive clinical research and precision medicine future” said Kwaku Owusu, CEO of DrugViu.

About Coral Genomics

Coral Genomics, founded in 2018 in San Francisco, California, generates novel data sets to fill gaps in large-scale biobanks with clinical diagnostics that facilitate medication selection for diverse populations. Integrating molecular, functional, and clinical factors to optimize treatment for chronic disease. Fueled by large, and rapidly growing, diverse experimental datasets that functionally represent the diversity of human response to therapies, Coral’s medication predictions promise to be significantly more accurate across age, gender, and race than current practice.

About DrugViu

DrugViu is a on a mission to accelerate research and drug development for autoimmune diseases by harnessing the collective power of patient data. We are a clinical grade real world evidence (RWE) + patient reported outcomes (PRO) platform. Our technology combines “quantitative data” (medical records) with “qualitative data” (self-reported outcomes) from patients with autoimmune diseases and make available to researchers. We work with biopharma, academia, clinicians and patient advocates to leverage our unique dataset, demographically diverse and anonymous patient population and registry to accelerate drug development, diversify clinical trials and enhance post market surveillance.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DYem6fuvkXI

Contact information

Coral – info@coralgenomics.com

DrugViu – info@drugviu.com

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