An artificial intelligence healthcare company claims its software can more accurately assess the extent of prostate cancer than medical professionals.
Avenda Health conducted a study that involved ten doctors evaluating 50 different cases of prostate cancer. The findings indicated that Avenda’s Unfold AI software achieved cancer detection with an accuracy rate of 84.7%, whereas doctors manually assessing the cases reached an accuracy range between 67.2% and 75.9%.
The research, which was partnered with UCLA Health and published in the Journal of Urology, revealed that utilizing AI for cancer contouring resulted in predictions for cancer size that were 45 times more accurate and consistent compared to traditional methods.
Shyam Natarajan, an assistant adjunct professor of urology, surgery, and bioengineering at UCLA and senior author of the study, noted that the aid of AI improved both the accuracy and consistency of doctors’ assessments, resulting in greater agreement among them when using AI for assistance.
Typically, doctors utilize MRIs to gauge tumor sizes; however, some tumors can be “MRI-invisible,” as explained by Dr. Wayne Brisbane, an assistant professor of urology at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. He emphasized that AI can provide support when MRIs are insufficient.
Brisbane stated that the integration of AI in cancer treatment could enhance the effectiveness and personalization of patient care, tailoring treatments to individual requirements and increasing success rates in combating the disease, claiming that AI can exceed human capabilities.
Dr. Shyam Natarajan, CEO of Avenda Health, expressed the significance of having their innovation validated through studies and acknowledged by the American Medical Association.
According to the American Cancer Society, roughly 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 illness. It is estimated that there will be 299,010 new cases of prostate cancer in the U.S. this year, with 35,250 expected fatalities from the disease.