An artificial intelligence healthcare company claims that its software can more accurately identify the extent of prostate cancer compared to traditional methods used by physicians.
Avenda Health conducted a study involving ten doctors who evaluated 50 prostate cancer cases each. The company’s Unfold AI software achieved a detection accuracy of 84.7%, while the physicians’ manual assessments ranged from 67.2% to 75.9%.
This research, conducted in collaboration with UCLA Health and published in the Journal of Urology, revealed that using AI for cancer contouring made predictions regarding tumor size 45 times more accurate and consistent compared to methods without AI assistance.
“We observed that AI assistance improved both the accuracy and consistency of doctors, leading to greater agreement among them,” stated Shyam Natarajan, an assistant adjunct professor at UCLA and the study’s senior author.
Doctors typically rely on MRIs to evaluate tumor size, but some tumors are not visible through this imaging method, according to Dr. Wayne Brisbane, an assistant professor of urology at UCLA’s David Geffen School of Medicine. AI technology addresses these limitations of MRIs.
“Ultimately, integrating AI into cancer treatment could facilitate more personalized and effective patient care, resulting in treatments that are specifically tailored to individual requirements and more effective in combating the disease,” Brisbane explained, noting that AI has the potential to surpass human capabilities.
Avenda Health CEO Dr. Shyam Natarajan emphasized the significance of this innovation, stating that it is “empowering for physicians” to witness such advancements being validated through research 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, and 1 in 44 may succumb to the disease. This year alone, there are expected to be 299,010 new cases of prostate cancer in the U.S., with 35,250 anticipated fatalities.