Nowadays, Artificial Intelligence is used extensively in the field of medical science to aid doctors to work more efficient and accurately. Bumrungrad is the first private hospital in Thailand which introduces AI technology approved by FDA in 2021 to assist radiologists in analyzing abnormalities in the lungs and detecting breast cancer.

   

What is AI?

AI is Artificial Intelligence that assists radiologists in screening, analyzing, and locating abnormalities in the lungs and detecting early stages of breast cancer by analyzing data from chest x-ray or mammogram images.

 

What kind of diseases can AI assist in diagnosis?
 

AI can assist in diagnosing lung diseases and breast cancer. It accurately detects 10 of the most common findings in chest x-ray such as lung nodule, lung infection, pneumothorax, and determines TB analysis score.

 

What are the advantages of using AI?
 

• Assists in early detection of breast cancer and lung cancer.  Therefore, patients have a better chance of successful treatment. Based on statistics, cancer patients have up to a 73% chance of survival for five years if cancer is identified at an early stage. However, if lung cancer is diagnosed at a later stage, a chance of survival decreases to 18%.¹ Whereas breast cancer patients have up to 99% chance of survival for five years if cancer is identified at an early stage, and a survival rate decreases to 86% to 29% if it is diagnosed at a later stage (the survival rate depends on the stage of the cancer at diagnosis)²
• Reduces missed lung cancer on chest x-ray in difficult locations.
• Diagnoses the emergency conditions faster such as pneumothorax and pleural effusion.
• Improves accuracy in diagnosing diseases and provides a data driven second opinion. AI provides insights to support doctors for clinical decision making.
• Reduces time to diagnosis diseases.

What are limitations of AI?
 

AI cannot diagnose patients less than 14 years of age and some conditions such as a bone fracture.


Bumrungrad hospital has a team of experienced physicians in the diagnosis and treatment of lung diseases and breast cancer, including pulmonologists, oncologists, breast surgical oncologists, pathologists and radiologists working closely with a multidisciplinary team of specialists to deliver the best treatment outcome.



Reference

¹ CXR: Jang, Sowon, et al. “Deep Learning–Based Automatic Detection Algorithm for Reducing Overlooked Lung Cancers on Chest Radiographs.” Radiology, vol. 296, no. 3, 2020, pp. 652–661., https://doi.org/10.1148/radiol.2020200165.

²  MMG: The American Cancer Society medical and editorial content team. “Survival Rates for Breast Cancer”, 2022, https://www.cancer.org/cancer/breast-cancer/understanding-a-breast-cancer-diagnosis/breast-cancer-survival-rates.html