An AI healthcare company claims that its software is more effective in detecting the extent of prostate cancer than traditional methods used by doctors.
Avenda Health recently published a study that involved ten physicians who evaluated 50 separate prostate cancer cases. The findings revealed that Avenda’s Unfold AI software achieved an accuracy rate of 84.7% in detecting cancer, while the doctors’ manual assessments ranged from 67.2% to 75.9%.
Conducted in collaboration with UCLA Health and featured in the Journal of Urology, the study also indicated that using AI for cancer contouring significantly improved the accuracy of size predictions—making them 45 times more consistent compared to traditional methods.
Shyam Natarajan, an assistant adjunct professor of urology, surgery, and bioengineering at UCLA and the study’s senior author, explained that AI assistance not only enhances the accuracy of diagnoses but also leads to greater consensus among doctors.
While doctors frequently rely on MRI scans to evaluate tumor sizes, some tumors are undetectable by MRIs, according to Dr. Wayne Brisbane, an assistant professor of urology at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. He noted that AI offers solutions in situations where MRIs fall short.
Brisbane emphasized that the integration of AI in cancer care could result in more effective and personalized treatment options, tailored to meet the specific needs of patients and improving treatment success rates. He remarked that AI can surpass human capabilities in certain aspects.
Avenda Health’s CEO, Dr. Shyam Natarajan, expressed optimism about the validation of their innovation through research and its recognition by the AMA.
According to the American Cancer Society, approximately 1 in 8 men in the U.S. will receive a prostate cancer diagnosis during their lifetime, and 1 in 44 will succumb to the disease. It is projected that there will be 299,010 new prostate cancer cases in the U.S. this year, with 35,250 fatalities attributed to the illness.