Avenda Health, an AI healthcare company, claims that its software can identify the extent of prostate cancer more accurately than medical professionals. A recent study conducted by the company involved ten doctors who evaluated 50 different cases of prostate cancer. The study revealed that Avenda’s Unfold AI software achieved an accuracy rate of 84.7% in detecting cancer, whereas the doctors’ manual assessments ranged between 67.2% and 75.9%.
This research, in collaboration with UCLA Health and published in the Journal of Urology, also highlighted that predictions regarding cancer size were 45 times more accurate when assisted by AI compared to traditional methods.
Shyam Natarajan, an assistant adjunct professor in urology, surgery, and bioengineering at UCLA and the senior author of the study, noted that the use of AI not only improved the accuracy of diagnoses but also increased consistency among doctors, facilitating greater agreement during assessments.
Traditionally, physicians rely on MRI scans to gauge tumor size; however, some tumors remain “MRI-invisible,” according to Dr. Wayne Brisbane, an assistant professor of urology at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. He emphasized that AI technology fills the gaps where MRI scans are inadequate.
Dr. Brisbane remarked that integrating AI in cancer treatments could foster more effective and personalized patient care, customizing therapies to better suit individual patients and enhancing their chances of overcoming the disease. He suggested that AI capabilities surpass those of human practitioners.
Avenda Health CEO Dr. Shyam Natarajan expressed that it is encouraging for doctors to witness this kind of innovation being validated through research and recognized by the American Medical Association.
According to the American Cancer Society, approximately 1 in 8 men will receive a prostate cancer diagnosis in their lifetime, and 1 in 44 men will succumb to the disease. In the United States, it is projected that there will be 299,010 new cases of prostate cancer this year, with an estimated 35,250 deaths resulting from the disease.