An AI healthcare company has announced that its software can detect the extent of prostate cancer with greater accuracy than traditional methods used by doctors.
Avenda Health recently published a study involving ten physicians who evaluated 50 different prostate cancer cases each. The results indicated that Avenda’s Unfold AI software achieved an accuracy rate of 84.7% in detecting cancer, compared to the accuracy scores of the physicians, which ranged from 67.2% to 75.9%.
Conducted in collaboration with UCLA Health and featured in the Journal of Urology, the study highlighted that when AI was used to assist in cancer contouring, predictions regarding the size of tumors were 45 times more accurate and consistent compared to manual methods.
Shyam Natarajan, an assistant adjunct professor of urology, surgery, and bioengineering at UCLA and the senior author of the study, noted that the use of AI enhanced both the accuracy and consistency of the doctors’ assessments, as they were more likely to reach agreement when utilizing AI support.
Traditionally, doctors rely on MRIs to gauge the size of tumors; however, some tumors are not detectable through this imaging method. Dr. Wayne Brisbane, an assistant professor of urology at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, emphasized that AI plays a crucial role in identifying those tumors that MRIs cannot visualize.
Dr. Brisbane remarked that the integration of AI in cancer treatment has the potential to lead to more effective and personalized care, enabling treatments that are closely aligned with individual patient needs and improving the chances of combating the disease.
Dr. Shyam Natarajan, CEO of Avenda Health, expressed excitement over the validation of their innovative approach through research that has garnered recognition from the American Medical Association.
According to the American Cancer Society, approximately 1 in 8 men in the U.S. will receive a prostate cancer diagnosis in their lifetime, with 1 in 44 men succumbing to the disease. This year, it is estimated that there will be 299,010 new cases of prostate cancer in the U.S., leading to 35,250 deaths.