An artificial intelligence healthcare company claims its software can detect the extent of prostate cancer more accurately than medical professionals.
Avenda Health conducted a study involving ten doctors, each evaluating 50 prostate cancer cases. The company’s Unfold AI software achieved an accuracy rate of 84.7% in detecting cancer, while the accuracy of the physicians’ manual assessments ranged between 67.2% and 75.9%.
The research, a collaboration with UCLA Health, was published in the Journal of Urology. It revealed that AI-assisted cancer contouring allowed for predictions of cancer size that were 45 times more precise compared to manual methods.
Shyam Natarajan, an assistant adjunct professor of urology, surgery, and bioengineering at UCLA and the study’s senior author, noted that using AI increased both the accuracy and consistency of the doctors’ assessments, leading to greater agreement among them.
Typically, physicians rely on MRI scans to evaluate tumor sizes; however, some tumors are not visible via MRI. Dr. Wayne Brisbane, an assistant professor of urology at UCLA’s David Geffen School of Medicine, stated that AI can assist in these challenging cases where MRIs fall short.
Brisbane emphasized that incorporating AI in cancer treatment could lead to more effective and personalized patient care, with therapies better suited to individual needs and more successful in combating the disease. He remarked that AI has the capability to exceed human performance.
Avenda Health’s CEO, Dr. Shyam Natarajan, expressed that it is encouraging for physicians to see such innovations validated through studies and recognized 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 in their lifetime, while 1 in 44 will succumb to the disease. It is projected that there will be 299,010 new prostate cancer cases in the U.S. this year, with an estimated 35,250 fatalities resulting from the illness.