Artificial Intelligence Accurately Detects Fractures on X-rays, Alerts Human Readers

Emergency room and urgent care clinics are typically busy and patients often have to wait many hours before they can be seen, evaluated and receive treatment. Waiting for x-rays to be interpreted by radiologists can contribute to this long wait time because radiologists often read x-rays for a large number of patients. A new study has found that artificial intelligence (AI) can help physicians in interpreting x-rays after an injury and suspected fracture. "Our AI algorithm can quickly and automatically detect x-rays that are positive for fractures and flag those studies in the system so that radiologists can prioritize reading x-rays with positive fractures. The system also highlights regions of interest with bounding boxes around areas where fractures are suspected. This can potentially contribute to less waiting time at the time of hospital or clinic visit before patients can get a positive diagnosis of fracture," explained corresponding Ali Guermazi, MD, PhD, chief of radiology at VA Boston Healthcare System and Professor of Radiology & Medicine at BUSM.