EPIC-CVD is the world’s largest case-cohort study of incident coronary heart disease and stroke events,  involving ~25,000 incident CVD cases embedded in the ~520,000-participant pan-European EPIC-CVD prospective cohort study located in 23 centres in 10 countries. To enhance the quality and comparability of data, the CEU has coordinated ascertainment and validation of incident CVD outcomes across centres. CVD cases are being compared with a randomly selected group of ~15,000 referents (ie, a “random subcohort”) established in collaboration with Professor Nick Wareham (who leads a parallel study in EPIC of incident type 2 diabetes that leverages the same sub-cohort).

For ~25,000 incident CVD cases and ~15,000 referents, the CEU has conducted high-density gene arrays (eg, GWAS, Exome chip, Metabochip) and assayed ~80 soluble biomarkers (eg, lipids, metabolic factors, fatty acids, vitamins, antioxidants). The combination of prospective study design, CVD-case richness, and genetic/biomarker detail should enable EPIC-CVD to support a range of efforts related to Mendelian randomisation analysis, and risk prediction and screening.