Study: Google's AI tech shows promise in detecting breast cancer

Google's artificial intelligence proved more accurate in identifying breast cancer from mammograms than doctors, according to a study published in Nature yesterday. The initial results of Google's AI for breast cancer screening, found that the system was able to reduce the number of both false positives and false negatives in breast cancer detection. The study was born out of a collaboration between DeepMind (an Alphabet-owned company), Cancer Research UK Imperial Centre, Northwestern University and Royal Surrey Country Hospital. "These findings show that our AI model spotted breast cancer in de-identified screening mammograms (where identifiable information has been removed) with greater accuracy, fewer false positives, and fewer false negatives than experts," Shravya Shetty, technical lead at Google health, and Dr. Daniel Tse, product manager at Google health, wrote in a blog. "This sets the stage for future applications where the model could potentially support radiologists performing breast cancer screenings." Researchers found that the AI was able to reduce the percentage of false negative mammograms by 5.7% in the US and 1.2% in the UK.