Frontiers in Digital Health · Feb 5, 2026

Predicting atrial fibrillation and flutter using BEHRT and identifying multimorbidity patterns using BERTopic

By Bae S, Kim Y, Park S et al.

INTRODUCTION: Atrial fibrillation and flutter are heart rhythm disorders frequently associated with multiple other chronic conditions, complicating their management and requiring optimized care. Analyzing pre-atrial fibrillation and flutter comorbidity patterns could enable proactive, preventive, and personalized healthcare. METHODS: This population-based nested case-control study analyzed data from the Korean National Health Insurance Corporation (2002-2019). Adults aged ≥19 years with at least three years of recorded claims were included. Cases were individuals newly diagnosed with atrial fibrillation and flutter between 2007 and 2019 following a washout period (2002-2006). Controls were matched 1:4 using stratified random sampling. Using 5-year disease histories, BEHRT, a transformer-based model, predicted atrial fibrillation and flutter, while BERTopic identified sex-specific multimorbidity patterns. Predictive performance was evaluated using the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC). RESULTS: BEHRT achieved an AUC of 0.80 for predicting atrial fibrillation and flutter among 600,030 participants (8,661 cases and 591,369 controls). BERTopic analysis revealed sex-specific multimorbidity patterns: aortic aneurysm, hypertensive heart disease, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease were common in males, while Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, and rheumatic heart disease were prominent in females. DISCUSSION: The combination of BEHRT and BERTopic demonstrated the ability to predict atrial fibrillation and flutter based on multimorbid histories while identifying distinct sex-specific disease patterns. These findings underscore the potential for artificial intelligence to enhance personalized healthcare and optimize prevention and management strategies for chronic conditions.

doi.org/10.3389/fdgth.2026.1722338Open accessPubMed 41728378Biomarkers