An AI healthcare firm claims its software can more accurately detect the extent of prostate cancer compared to traditional methods employed by doctors.
Avenda Health conducted a study last month involving ten physicians who evaluated 50 different prostate cancer cases. The company’s Unfold AI software achieved an accuracy rate of 84.7% in detecting cancer, while doctors using manual methods reported accuracy rates ranging from 67.2% to 75.9%.
The research, conducted in collaboration with UCLA Health and published in the Journal of Urology, highlighted that incorporating AI for cancer contouring resulted in predictions of tumor size being 45 times more accurate and consistent than without AI assistance.
According to Shyam Natarajan, the assistant adjunct professor of urology, surgery, and bioengineering at UCLA and senior author of the study, the use of AI not only enhanced the accuracy of the doctors but also facilitated greater agreement among them when AI support was used.
While doctors typically rely on MRIs to determine tumor size, some tumors are not detectable via this method, as noted by Dr. Wayne Brisbane, an assistant professor of urology at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. He emphasized that AI serves as a critical tool in instances where MRIs fall short.
Dr. Brisbane further stated that the integration of AI in cancer treatment has the potential to provide more effective and personalized care, allowing treatments to be better tailored to the individual needs of patients, thus increasing the likelihood of successful outcomes against the disease. He remarked that AI can surpass human capabilities.
Avenda Health’s CEO, Dr. Shyam Natarajan, expressed enthusiasm over the validation of such innovations through studies and acknowledgment from 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. The forecast for this year indicates there will be around 299,010 new prostate cancer cases in the U.S., with 35,250 expected fatalities.