Luxembourg Institute of Health Leads Major European Initiative on Voice-Based Health Technologies

eVoiceNet, a newly funded COST Action led by the Deep Digital Phenotyping (DDP) team from the Department of Precision Health (DoPH), will boost innovation in vocal biomarkers across Europe and beyond.

• Deep Digital Phenotyping Research Unit
• Department of Precision Health

The Luxembourg Institute of Health (LIH) is proud to announce that it will coordinate eVoiceNet—the “European Network to Advance the Development and Implementation of Vocal Biomarkers”—recently selected for funding by the COST programme. Bringing together already more than 80 partners from 31 countries in Europe and beyond, eVoiceNet aims to establish Europe as a global leader in utilizing voice to detect, monitor, and manage diseases through the development of vocal biomarkers.

Vocal biomarkers, features extracted from a person’s voice that are linked to health outcomes, are a promising digital health tool for diagnosing and tracking a wide range of conditions, including neurological and mental health disorders, as well as respiratory and cardiovascular diseases. However, the field faces major challenges, including fragmented research efforts, lack of standardisation in voice data collection, and ethical and privacy concerns.

Led by the LIH, eVoiceNet will address these issues by building a diverse, interdisciplinary network of clinicians, AI researchers, voice experts, legal specialists, patient groups, and industry stakeholders.

“The voice is one of the most accessible and personal parameters of one’s health,” says Dr Guy Fagherazzi, project leader and Director of the Department of Precision Health at the LIH. “With our partners at eVoiceNet, we are creating a unique framework to transform your voice into a trusted clinical endpoint and digital health solution to detect diseases and monitor your health.”

Over the course of four years, the international network will deliver guidelines, best practices, privacy-preserving principles, educational and training tools, and open-source resources to support the clinical adoption and innovation of trustworthy AI-based vocal biomarkers. eVoiceNet will also engage with regulators and healthcare providers to ensure safe and effective integration of vocal biomarkers into health systems.

With only 8% of COST Action proposals selected for funding in this year’s highly competitive call, the leadership of the LIH in eVoiceNet confirms Luxembourg’s growing role in shaping the future of AI-driven healthcare.