Previous research has demonstrated that AI is able to detect tissue changes indicative of cancer. In the current study, published in Scientific Reports, the researchers show that AI can also find cancers missed by pathologists.

“The study has been nicknamed the ‘missed study,’ as the goal of finding the cancer was ‘missed’ by the pathologists. We have now shown that with the help of AI, it is possible to find signs of prostate cancer that were not observed by pathologists in more than 80% of samples from men who later developed cancer,” says Carolina Wählby, who led the AI development in the study.

The project is based on a collaboration with Umeå University, where the researchers collected samples from men called for sample-taking over a number of years. All 232 men in the study were assessed as healthy when their biopsies were examined by pathologists. After less than two-and-a-half years, half of the men in the study had developed aggressive prostate cancer, while the rest were still cancer-free eight years later.