McLaren Deploys AI to Find Hidden Heart Disease in Routine Scans

GRAND BLANC, MI – February 17, 2026 – In a significant move to combat the nation's leading cause of death, McLaren Health Care has launched a pioneering artificial intelligence program designed to uncover hidden signs of heart disease from thousands of existing medical scans. The initiative, a first of its kind in Michigan, leverages AI to analyze routine chest CT scans, which were originally performed for other medical reasons, to identify patients at risk for serious cardiovascular conditions long before symptoms may arise.

The program, developed in partnership with the health-tech firm Bunkerhill Health, utilizes an AI platform called Carebricks to flag early indicators of heart disease. This allows McLaren’s physicians to proactively intervene, potentially saving lives and shifting the paradigm of cardiac care from reactive treatment to proactive prevention.

A New Frontier in Preventive Cardiology

Traditionally, screening for heart disease required dedicated, specialized imaging like a cardiac CT scan, a process that is often costly, time-consuming, and not widely accessible as a general screening tool. As a result, countless opportunities for early detection have been missed, with many patients only discovering their condition after a major cardiac event.

McLaren's new approach fundamentally changes this dynamic. The AI system retrospectively analyzes routine chest CT scans—often ordered for lung cancer screenings, pneumonia evaluations, or post-injury assessments—that have been performed over the past year. The platform’s FDA-cleared algorithms search for two critical biomarkers: incidental coronary artery calcium (iCAC) and incidental aortic valve calcium (iAVC). The presence of this calcium is a well-established indicator for coronary heart disease and aortic stenosis, respectively—conditions that can worsen silently over time.

“Launching this innovative, AI-powered cardiovascular screening program further reflects our commitment to preventive, data-driven care, especially at a time when heart disease remains the leading cause of death and a growing public health crisis,” said Dr. Samer Kazziha, Chief Medical Director of the McLaren Heart & Vascular Institute. “By using the clinical information already available to us, this program enables us to identify patients who may benefit from earlier follow-up, often before symptoms appear, and ensures they are connected to the right care at the right time.”

McLaren is now one of just five health systems in the nation deploying AI for aortic valve calcium detection on routine scans. This is powered by Bunkerhill Health’s AVC algorithm, which holds the distinction of being the first FDA-cleared solution for this specific purpose. By repurposing existing clinical data, the system provides a powerful new screening capability without requiring patients to undergo additional tests, radiation exposure, or appointments.

More Than an Algorithm: AI as an Operational Engine

While the diagnostic potential of AI is significant, its practical implementation in a busy hospital setting has been a major hurdle for healthcare systems nationwide. Many AI tools stall before reaching clinical practice, failing to integrate smoothly into existing workflows. Bunkerhill Health's Carebricks platform is designed to solve this "last mile" problem.

The platform functions as a comprehensive "system of action" rather than just a standalone detection tool. It integrates directly with McLaren’s electronic health records (EHR), allowing the AI to not only identify at-risk patients but also to "reason" across their full clinical context. The system analyzes a patient's medical history, current treatment plans, and established clinical guidelines to determine who requires immediate follow-up, effectively filtering out false positives and reducing alert fatigue for clinicians.

Once a high-risk patient is identified, the platform helps automate the subsequent steps, from notifying care coordinators to guiding the next actions based on McLaren's own protocols. This automation is critical, as launching a screening program of this magnitude would normally place an immense manual burden on clinical teams for chart review and care coordination.

“McLaren Health Care is showing how health systems can turn advanced AI capabilities into real-world clinical action,” said Nishith Khandwala, Co-Founder and CEO of Bunkerhill Health. “Using Carebricks, McLaren is deploying AI agents that leverage FDA-cleared coronary and aortic valve calcium algorithms to reason across clinical context and help initiate appropriate next steps, while maintaining the flexibility to expand into new use cases over time.”

This ability to streamline operations allows McLaren to expand access to early cardiovascular screening at a massive scale while minimizing the added workload for its medical staff, a crucial factor in an era of widespread clinician burnout.

The Patient Experience and a Growing National Trend

For patients, this technology presents a new paradigm of unexpected hope. An individual who undergoes a chest CT scan after a minor car accident could, days later, be notified of a previously unknown but significant risk for heart disease, enabling them to seek preventive care that could avert a future heart attack. This opportunistic screening transforms a routine diagnostic test into a powerful tool for long-term health.

However, the approach also raises important considerations about the communication of incidental findings. The process requires sensitive, clear communication protocols and robust follow-up pathways to manage patient anxiety and ensure they are seamlessly connected to cardiologists and appropriate care plans. The automated nature of the Carebricks platform is designed to ensure these connections are made efficiently, preventing at-risk patients from falling through the cracks.

McLaren's initiative is part of a broader, rapidly accelerating trend. Health systems across the country are increasingly looking to AI to extract more value from existing medical data. Institutions like UCSF Medical Center and Mass General Brigham have deployed similar AI models for detecting coronary calcium, while Corewell Health, also in Michigan, has been using AI to find undetected heart disease in CAT scans. The market is also seeing a rise in companies like Aidoc and HeartLung Corporation offering competing solutions for opportunistic screening.

This places McLaren at the forefront of a major shift in medicine, moving from a model of treating sickness to one of proactively preserving wellness. By harnessing the power of artificial intelligence to see what was previously hidden in plain sight, the health system is not just adopting new technology, but is fundamentally rethinking how to keep its community healthy.