Artificial intelligence is better at spotting prostate cancer than hospital doctors, a groundbreaking study found. Developed by experts, the computer system was trained and then tested on more than 10,000 prostate MRI examinations on patients. Using the AI resulted in half fewer false positives and slashed the number of clinically insignificant cancers by a fifth when compared to radiologists, the research revealed. Doctors believe it could help reduce overdiagnosis and prevent unnecessary surgery in the most common cancer among men, hugely benefitting any future screening programme. Researchers predict using AI to help read scans will be crucial in addressing the rising demand in medical imaging worldwide.

Model developed at MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory could reduce false positives and unnecessary surgeries. Every year 40,000 women die from breast cancer in the U.S. alone. When cancers are found early, they can often be cured. Mammograms are the best test available, but they're still imperfect and often result in false positive results that can lead to unnecessary biopsies and surgeries. One common cause of false positives are so-called "high-risk" lesions that appear suspicious on mammograms and have abnormal cells when tested by needle biopsy. In this case, the patient typically undergoes surgery to have the lesion removed; however, the lesions turn out to be benign at surgery 90 percent of the time.

Breast cancer is a condition that claims the lives of 40,000 women every year in the U.S. alone. While mammograms are useful, not they're not perfect and often give off false positives, leading to unneeded biopsies and unnecessary surgery. High-risk lesions are one common cause of false positives. When tested with a biopsy needle they show abnormal cells and they appear as suspicious on mammograms too. So then, what can we do to improve these methods and ultimately save lives?