A healthcare technology company claims its software can more accurately detect the extent of prostate cancer compared to traditional methods used by doctors.
Avenda Health published a study last month featuring ten doctors who evaluated 50 prostate cancer cases each. The findings revealed that Avenda’s Unfold AI software achieved a detection accuracy of 84.7%, while the physicians’ manual assessments ranged from 67.2% to 75.9%.
This study, conducted with UCLA Health and appeared in the Journal of Urology, indicated that the integration of AI in cancer contouring significantly enhanced the accuracy of cancer size predictions, making them 45 times more precise and consistent than assessments done without AI.
Shyam Natarajan, an assistant adjunct professor of urology, surgery, and bioengineering at UCLA and the study’s senior author, noted that the use of AI assistance increased both the accuracy and consistency of doctors’ assessments, leading to greater agreement among them.
While doctors typically rely on MRI scans to assess tumor sizes, some tumors remain “MRI-invisible,” as highlighted by Dr. Wayne Brisbane, an assistant professor of urology at UCLA’s David Geffen School of Medicine. He emphasized that AI can fill the gaps left by MRIs.
Dr. Brisbane added, “Overall, the incorporation of AI in cancer treatment may lead to more effective and personalized care, enabling treatments to be finely tuned to patients’ specific needs while improving success rates against the disease.” He acknowledged that AI has the potential to surpass human capabilities.
Avenda Health’s CEO, Dr. Shyam Natarajan, expressed that it is motivating for physicians to see such innovations validated through research and recognized by organizations like the American Medical Association (AMA).
The American Cancer Society estimates that about 1 in 8 men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer in their lifetime, and 1 in 44 men will succumb to the illness. This year, approximately 299,010 new prostate cancer cases are expected in the U.S., with an estimated 35,250 fatalities due to the disease.