GlobalData analysis suggests that early lung cancer detection could vastly improve patient outcomes. Image credit: PeopleImages.com – Yuri A via Shutterstock.
University Hospitals (UH) Cleveland Medical Center has forged a partnership with Qure.ai to assess the company’s AI technology for early lung cancer detection.
Cleared by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in 2024, Qure.ai’s qXR AI algorithm highlights regions of the lung, based on chest X-rays, in which pulmonary nodules ranging from six to 30mm are suspected to be present.
Current guidelines recommend low-dose CT (LDCT) lung cancer screening as the standard of care for high-risk individuals, such as smokers and former smokers. However, Dr Amit Gupta, director of diagnostic radiography at University Hospitals Cleveland Medical Center, stated that CT screening uptake remains ‘alarmingly low’ nationally, with only 16 out of every 100 eligible individuals in the US undergoing screening.
According to Dr Gupta, while identifying early-stage lung nodules and cancers incidentally when patients undergo chest X-rays for other medical reasons during hospital admissions is an apt way of detecting early-stage lung cancer, identifying pulmonary nodules on X-rays remains a significant challenge because subtle findings can be easily overlooked.
To address this challenge, UH plans to conduct a clinical study to compare Qure.ai’s qXR AI algorithm in its ability to detect pulmonary nodules in comparison to a radiologist’s interpretation of the same chest X-rays.
Dr Gupta said: “This AI-driven approach may aid in identifying more nodules which we hope supports patient care and enables us to evaluate the broader impact of medical imaging AI.
“The clinical trial will evaluate how many patients require follow-up CT scans, biopsies, and how many more lung cancer cases are diagnosed earlier using AI.
“The hope is that this clinical trial will not only advance early detection but also drive meaningful transformation in lung cancer surveillance.”
Lung cancer is one of the disease’s dominant forms worldwide. The International Agency for Research on Cancer estimates that the annual mortality due to the illness will increase by 50% from around two million deaths currently in 2022 to more than three million by 2040.
According to GlobalData analysis, the projected increase highlights the critical importance of detecting lung cancer at the early stages to influence the best possible patient outcomes.
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