Avenda Health, an AI healthcare company, claims its software can identify the extent of prostate cancer more accurately than human doctors.
In a study released last month involving ten doctors who evaluated 50 prostate cancer cases each, Avenda’s Unfold AI software demonstrated an accuracy rate of 84.7% in detecting cancer. In contrast, the physicians’ manual assessments had accuracy rates ranging from 67.2% to 75.9%.
The research, conducted in collaboration with UCLA Health and published in the Journal of Urology, also highlighted that AI-assisted cancer contouring produced predictions of tumor size that were 45 times more accurate and consistent than traditional methods.
“We observed that the use of AI assistance improved both the accuracy and consistency of the doctors’ assessments, leading to greater agreement among them when AI was utilized,” said Dr. Shyam Natarajan, assistant adjunct professor of urology, surgery, and bioengineering at UCLA and the study’s senior author.
Typically, doctors rely on MRIs to gauge tumor size; however, some tumors remain undetectable in MRI scans. Dr. Wayne Brisbane, an assistant professor of urology at UCLA’s David Geffen School of Medicine, noted that AI can help identify what MRIs miss.
“The integration of AI in cancer treatment could result in more effective and personalized patient care, providing treatments that are better suited to individual needs and more proficient in combatting the disease,” Brisbane commented. He emphasized that AI has the potential to “exceed human capabilities.”
Dr. Shyam Natarajan, CEO of Avenda Health, expressed that it is “empowering for physicians to witness this type of innovation being validated through research and acknowledged by the AMA.”
According to the American Cancer Society, approximately 1 in 8 men in the United States will be diagnosed with prostate cancer during their lives, and 1 in 44 men will succumb to the disease. This year, it is estimated that there will be 299,010 new prostate cancer cases and 35,250 related deaths in the U.S.