| Title | AI-Supported Test for Very Early Signs of Glaucoma Progression | |
| Date | Wednesday May 06 2020, @11:34AM | |
| Author | Fnord666 | |
| Topic | ||
| from the better-prediction-leads-to-better-outcomes dept. | ||
Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:
A new test can detect glaucoma progression 18 months earlier than the current gold standard method, according to results from a UCL-sponsored clinical trial.
The technology, supported by an artificial intelligence (AI) algorithm, could help accelerate clinical trials, and eventually may be used in detection and diagnostics, according to the Wellcome-funded study published today in Expert Review of Molecular Diagnostics.
Lead researcher Professor Francesca Cordeiro (UCL Institute of Ophthalmology, Imperial College London, and Western Eye Hospital Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust) said: "We have developed a quick, automated and highly sensitive way to identify which people with glaucoma are at risk of rapid progression to blindness."
[...] The test, called DARC (Detection of Apoptosing Retinal Cells), involves injecting into the bloodstream (via the arm) a fluorescent dye that attaches to retinal cells, and illuminates those that are in the process of apoptosis, a form of programmed cell death. The damaged cells appear bright white when viewed in eye examinations -- the more damaged cells detected, the higher the DARC count.
[...] In the Phase II clinical trial of DARC, the AI was used to assess 60 of the study participants (20 with glaucoma and 40 healthy control subjects). The AI was initially trained by analysing the retinal scans (after injection of the dye) of the healthy control subjects. The AI was then tested on the glaucoma patients.
Those taking part in the AI study were followed up 18 months after the main trial period to see whether their eye health had deteriorated.
The researchers were able to accurately predict progressive glaucomatous damage 18 months before that seen with the current gold standard OCT retinal imaging technology, as every patient with a DARC count over a certain threshold was found to have progressive glaucoma at follow-up.
"These results are very promising as they show DARC could be used as a biomarker when combined with the AI-aided algorithm," said Professor Cordeiro, adding that biomarkers -- measurable biological indicators of disease state or severity -- are urgently needed for glaucoma, to speed up clinical trials as the disease progresses slowly so it can take years for symptoms to change.
[...] The AI-supported technology has recently been approved by both the UK's Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency and the USA's Food and Drug Administration as an exploratory endpoint for testing a new glaucoma drug in a clinical trial.
Journal Reference:
Eduardo M Normando, Tim E Yap, John Maddison, et al. A CNN-aided method to predict glaucoma progression using DARC (Detection of Apoptosing Retinal Cells). Expert Review of Molecular Diagnostics, 2020; DOI: 10.1080/14737159.2020.1758067
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printed from SoylentNews, AI-Supported Test for Very Early Signs of Glaucoma Progression on 2023-07-07 05:14:39