Image credit: Rahul Pandit, Pexels.
Hello Everyone,
To my readers who might be men above 50 and aging, you might want to listen up. About 1 in 8 men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer during their lifetime. But each man’s risk of prostate cancer can vary, based on his age, race/ethnicity, and other factors. About 6 in 10 prostate cancers are diagnosed in men who are 65 or older, and it is rare in men under 40.
I’m tracking how AI is being used in various kinds of Cancer and the papers and reports are somewhat optimistic. You can read more AI in healthcare and related Techno optimism about AI on my AI Newsletter in the section called Benefactor. Read: AI breakthrough improves Alzheimer’s predictions.
I’m very positive about the impact of AI in healthcare in the long-run. Whatever the geopolitical, political, economic and military implication of AI in the 21st century where I think it deserves more scrutiny, in terms of well-being, AI will increasingly play a surprisingly important and vital role.
So much of the future of healthcare is prevention, early detection and a more personalized medicine for example knowing which treatment is the most appropriate for a particular patient at a particular time.
It turns out AI, is surprisingly good at helping with those things.
AI Will Improve Cancer Screening and Save Lives
Recently there’s been some good news of the impact of AI and AI tools in both Breast Cancer and Prostate Cancer. While deaths from breast cancer have fallen 43 percent over the last three decades thanks to advancements in screening and treatment, we can reduce that further with the help of AI.
Meanwhile, AI-based tools can boost research productivity in daily workflows for physicians and researchers, but can also extract hidden information from existing data, thereby enabling new scientific discoveries and medical diagnosis of multiple forms of cancer, meaning our screening and early detection will become a lot better in Cancer detection. New treatments discovered with the help of AI might also begin to appear.
Overall I believe AI is helping to improve the speed, accuracy, and reliability of some cancer screening and detection methods. This will only get better in the next few decades.
Let’s get to our Prostate Cancer case study.
The Unfold AI tool was more Accurate than Physicians
A new study from UCLA found that an AI tool identified prostate cancer with 84% accuracy — compared to 67% accuracy for cases detected by physicians, according to a press release from the university.
The AI tool, Unfold AI, created by Avenda Health, uses an algorithm to visualize the likelihood of cancer based on various types of clinical data. This technology has been cleared by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and has shown a significant improvement in the negative margin rate, reducing the chances of residual cancer being left behind after surgery.
In the study, a team of seven urologists and three radiologists analyzed 50 cases where tumors had been removed, looking for signs of residual cancer.
The “negative margin rate” — a medical term that describes the absence of cancer cells surrounding the removed tissue — was 45 times greater in AI-detected cases, so the chances of cancer being left behind was far less.
Ali Kasraeian, M.D., a urologist at Kasraeian Urology in Jacksonville, Florida, said he uses the Unfold AI technology in his consultations with patients about managing their prostate cancer.
“The AI takes the information that we currently have about a patient’s prostate cancer — like their pathology, imaging and biopsy results — and creates a 3D cancer estimation map.”
The findings were published in the Journal of Urology
Based on these findings, the AI could lead to more accurate diagnoses and more targeted treatments, reducing the need for full-gland removal and the side effects that can come with it, such as incontinence and impotence, the researchers wrote.
“The results we get from Unfold AI tell us if a patient will be better suited for focal therapy or more radical therapy, such as radical prostatectomy, or radiation therapy, ensuring we optimize their cancer cure, the personalization of their cancer care, and their quality of life goals.”
Increasingly AI tools with improved early detection can help physicians guide a more personalized treatment plan for patients that might also help healthcare systems reduce costs. This may also mean less fear and less invasive treatments.
Prostate Cancer is Common
Prostate cancer, unfortunately, is common. It affects one in seven men, making it the second most common cancer among men worldwide.
The American Cancer Society’s estimates for prostate cancer in the United States for 2024 are:
🔵 About 299,010 new cases of prostate cancer.
🟣 About 35,250 deaths from prostate cancer.
“So many men are afraid of treatment because of the risks associated with gland removal, and Unfold AI enables therapies that don’t put men through the meat grinder,” he said.
“Too often, we are given only two options: Watch and wait for it to get worse, or take the entire gland out, which often leaves men with lifelong side effects that strain their physical health, emotional health and even their marriages,” he said.
The 3D map created by Unfold AI enabled this team to identify precise margins, target the cancerous area and avoid any functional structures of the gland.
AI improves Survival Rates
New AI tools augment the ability of physicians to make better treatment decisions and have more ‘diagnostic allies’ that can help them do their jobs better.
The investigators from UCLA Health found using artificial intelligence to help map out the boundaries of cancerous prostate tissue can significantly reduce the risk of underestimating the extent of prostate cancer — an advancement that can help ensure an accurate diagnosis, precise treatment planning and effective surgical procedures.
The researchers found when using conventional means, doctors only achieved a negative margin 1.6% of the time. When assisted by AI the number increased to 72.8%.
“We saw the use of AI assistance made doctors both more accurate and more consistent, meaning doctors tended to agree more when using AI assistance,” said Shyam Natarajan, assistant adjunct professor of urology, surgery, and bioengineering and senior author of the study.
The team also found that the use of AI increased clinician recommendations for focal therapy among patients with unilateral cancer and reduced variation in accurate tumor encapsulation, which could help reduce the risk of side effects commonly associated with more aggressive treatments like surgery or radiation therapy.
I could not find much information about the Unfold AI tool.
Interested in AI in Healthcare and Diseases?
Here is some of my previous work summarizing mostly papers in the area:
Breast Cancer
Radiology
Autism
Alzheimer’s
Heart disease
Cancer
Parkinson’s
AI breakthrough improves Alzheimer’s predictions~ HERE.
AI in mammography screening is safe and dramatically reduces Radiologist workloads ~ HERE.
🤯 A.I. is Starting to Build the Future of Healthcare ~ HERE.
A.I. Can Help Detect Brain Tumor Boundaries ~ HERE.
Google AI and Breast Cancer Making Progress ~ HERE.
Artificial Intelligence will enable Early Autism Detection ~ HERE.
AI and the Future of Sepsis ~ HERE.
A.I. in Alzheimer’s disease in 2022 ~ HERE.
Are A.I. Eye Checks the New Heart Disease Warning Test? ~ HERE.
Why A.I. in Healthcare is a New Paradigm ~ HERE.
AI Detects Tuberculosis from X-rays ~ HERE.
AI and Drug Overdose Deaths ~ HERE.
AI Has the Potential to Transform Healthcare ~ HERE.
AI can reveal new cell biology ~ HERE.
AI Evolving our Understanding of the Human Gut ~ HERE.
Artificial Intelligence is improving the use of Hearing Aids ! ~ HERE.
Hospitals are turning to AI to Shorten Hospital Stays ~ HERE.
A.I. Can Now Predict Tumor Regrowth in Cancer Patients ~ HERE.
Artificial Intelligence in Autism Detection ~ HERE.
The Future of A.I. in Healthcare. ~ HERE.
Artificial Intelligence is Taking on Parkinson’s Disease. ~HERE.
Artificial Intelligence Helps Cut Miss Rate of Colorectal Polyps. ~ HERE.
A.I. Advances in Treatment Of Spinal Cord Injuries and Surgery. ~ HERE.
Future of A.I. in Neurosurgery. ~ HERE.
Artificial Intelligence Could Help Detect Onset of Cardiovascular Disease. ~ HERE.
Can A.I Improve our Breast Cancer Screening?~ HERE.
Artificial Intelligence is Changing the Future of Radiology. ~ HERE.
What do the Experts say?
Dr. Harvey Castro, a board-certified emergency medicine physician and national speaker on artificial intelligence based in Dallas, Texas, was not involved in the new study but shared his insights on the potential risks associated with the technology.
“The accuracy of AI depends heavily on the quality of the data it is trained on”. “While AI is a powerful tool, it should complement, not replace, the clinical judgment of health care professionals,” he said in the Fox story reproduced by the New York Post and others.
It’s interesting to me that you are starting to see more of these AI studies become mainstream (MSM) news. While the cost of AI technologies can also be a significant barrier, might they in the long-term mean less invasive treatments, better outcomes, more cost saved in early diagnosis and more personalized care for patients leading to a lower burden on our healthcare systems?
I’m not usually browing the Journal of Urology, however new AI tools and studies will lead invariably to better healthcare outcomes. Artificial Intelligence in cancer diagnosis and treatment in my opinion has a very bright future. This is why I consider it an important thing to cover.
Early Onset Cancer?
In recent years early onset cancer is becoming more prevalent, making early screening that much more important. Early-onset cancers, defined as cancer cases diagnosed in people under 50, increased globally by a staggering 79%. In the United States, the American Cancer Society reported that the demographics of cancer patients are increasingly shifting from older individuals to middle-aged people.
The incidence appears to be mostly linked to colorectal and 13 other types of cancers, many of which affect the digestive system, and this increase is happening across many middle- and high-income nations.
Colorectal cancer (CRC) is the third most common cancer, and its malignancy is the second deadliest for males and females combined. You can read more about AI in CRC here.
In general, research shows that excess body fat increases your risk for several cancers, including colorectal, post-menopausal breast, uterine, esophageal, kidney and pancreatic cancers. How might we use AI to help us with lifestyle interventions in the future?
Future of AI Devices in Healthcare Monitoring
If Generative AI is making its way on our PCs and mobile devices with Apple Intelligence and into Google Pixel phones, Microsoft devices or Dell laptops, what might this mean for the future of our lifestyle health tracking? I’ve always been a fan of ambient computing, IoT or whatever variety of the “quantified self” you subscribe to. Can our lifestyle data be summarized by AI in a meaningful way in 2024?
Not yet, but it’s still interesting.
Samsung Calls it “AI-Powered” Health
This is not an endorsement or even directly related to our topic but I’m a bit of an enthusiast when it comes to health tracking devices and products like Samsung’s new Galaxy Ring.
After months of teasing, Samsung officially announced the $399.99 smart ring on July 10th, 2024. At 7mm wide and 2.6mm thick, it’s reputed to be slimmer than for example the popular Oura Ring.
Each morning, the Ring feeds information about your previous day to Samsung Health, which gives you an Energy Score comprised of the following factors: Sleep time average, Sleep time consistency, Bed/wake time consistency, Sleep timing, Previous day activity, Sleeping heart rate, and Sleeping heart rate variability, or HRV.
So unlike leading competitors, it does not require any additional subscription fees to access features. However, it does require an Android phone compatible with the Samsung Health app. One day I’ll look into the AI of healthcare tracking devices in more detail.
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