A healthcare technology firm has claimed that its AI-powered software can more accurately assess the extent of prostate cancer than traditional methods employed by physicians.
Avenda Health conducted a study last month featuring ten doctors who evaluated a total of 50 prostate cancer cases. The results indicated that Avenda’s Unfold AI software achieved an accuracy rate of 84.7% in detecting cancer, whereas the doctors’ manual assessments varied with an accuracy rate between 67.2% and 75.9%.
This research, which was conducted in collaboration with UCLA Health and published in the Journal of Urology, revealed that incorporating AI into cancer contouring led to size estimations being 45 times more accurate and consistent than those made without AI assistance.
According to Shyam Natarajan, an assistant adjunct professor at UCLA and the senior author of the study, the integration of AI assistance improved both the accuracy and consistency of the doctors’ assessments, resulting in greater agreement among them.
Traditionally, doctors rely on MRI scans to evaluate tumor size. However, some tumors are not visible on MRIs. Dr. Wayne Brisbane, an assistant professor of urology at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, noted that AI technology can be especially beneficial in these cases where MRIs are insufficient.
Dr. Brisbane remarked that leveraging AI in cancer treatment could pave the way for more effective and personalized patient care, tailoring treatments more closely to individual needs and enhancing their success against the disease.
Avenda Health’s CEO, Dr. Shyam Natarajan, stated that it is encouraging for physicians to witness such innovations being validated through rigorous studies and recognized by the American Medical Association.
According to the American Cancer Society, approximately one in eight men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer at some point in their lives, with one in 44 men likely to succumb to the illness. This year, it is projected that there will be 299,010 new prostate cancer diagnoses in the United States, with an estimated 35,250 fatalities attributed to the disease.