An artificial intelligence healthcare company claims that its software can detect the extent of prostate cancer more accurately than medical professionals.
Avenda Health conducted a study last month involving ten doctors who evaluated 50 different cases of prostate cancer. The results showed that Avenda’s Unfold AI software achieved an accuracy rate of 84.7% in detecting cancer, while the accuracy of the doctors ranged from 67.2% to 75.9%.
This study, carried out in collaboration with UCLA Health and published in the Journal of Urology, further revealed that the use of AI for cancer contouring resulted in predictions of tumor size that were 45 times more accurate and consistent compared to assessments made without AI assistance.
Shyam Natarajan, assistant adjunct professor of urology, surgery, and bioengineering at UCLA and the study’s senior author, highlighted that AI assistance not only improved doctors’ accuracy but also made their evaluations more consistent, leading to greater agreement among the physicians when utilizing AI tools.
Typically, doctors rely on MRI scans to determine tumor size, but some tumors are “MRI-invisible.” Dr. Wayne Brisbane, an assistant professor of urology at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, explained that AI can fill the gaps where MRI technology does not suffice.
Dr. Brisbane emphasized that the integration of AI in cancer treatment has the potential to provide patients with more effective and personalized care, as treatments can be better tailored to meet individual needs and improve the chances of combating the disease.
Avenda Health CEO Dr. Shyam Natarajan expressed that it is empowering for physicians to see such innovations being 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, and 1 in 44 men will succumb to the disease. It is projected that there will be 299,010 new cases of prostate cancer in the U.S. this year, with 35,250 expected fatalities from the illness.