An artificial intelligence healthcare firm announced that its software identifies the extent of prostate cancer more accurately than medical professionals.
Avenda Health recently published a study involving ten doctors, each evaluating 50 prostate cancer cases. The study revealed that Avenda’s Unfold AI software achieved an accuracy rate of 84.7% in detecting cancer, while the physicians’ manual assessments ranged from 67.2% to 75.9%.
Conducted in collaboration with UCLA Health and appearing in the Journal of Urology, the study showed that incorporating AI for cancer contouring improved predictions of tumor size, making them 45 times more accurate and consistent.
According to Shyam Natarajan, assistant adjunct professor of urology, surgery, and bioengineering at UCLA and the study’s senior author, the integration of AI assistance increased both the accuracy and consistency of the doctors’ assessments, leading to greater agreement among them.
Dr. Wayne Brisbane, an assistant professor of urology at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, noted that while doctors typically rely on MRIs to determine tumor size, certain tumors can be “MRI-invisible.” He emphasized that AI technology addresses these limitations.
Brisbane added that using AI in cancer treatment could enhance personalized care for patients, enabling treatments that are more effectively aligned with individual needs and more capable of combating the disease. He asserted that AI has the potential to surpass human capabilities.
Dr. Shyam Natarajan, CEO of Avenda Health, expressed that it is encouraging for physicians to witness such innovations validated through studies and acknowledged by the American Medical Association.
According to the American Cancer Society, approximately 1 in 8 men in the U.S. will be diagnosed with prostate cancer during their lifetime, with 1 in 44 expected to die from it. The society estimates that there will be 299,010 new cases of prostate cancer in 2023, resulting in 35,250 deaths from the disease.