A new research programme is to receive more than £11 million in funding to explore the use artificial intelligence to improve the diagnosis of lung cancer and other thoracic diseases.
The funding from UK Research and Innovation, Cancer Research UK and industry, will provide the Oxford based research team the opportunity to accelerate the use of technology to support earlier diagnosis.
Working with the NHS England Lung Health Check programme, clinical, imaging and molecular data will be combined for the first time using AI algorithms with the aim of more accurately and quickly diagnosing and characterising lung cancer.
The team will also develop algorithms to focus on evaluating risks from comorbidities such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.
Professor Fergus Gleeson, Consultant Radiologist at Oxford University Hospitals, is leading the programme “The novel linking of diagnostic technologies, patient outcomes and biomarkers using AI has the potential to make a real difference to how people with suspected lung cancer are investigated.”
“By differentiating between cancers and non-cancers more accurately, based on the initial CT scan and blood tests, we hope to remove the delay and possible harm caused by repeat scans and further invasive tests. If successful, this has the potential to reduce patient anxiety and diagnose cancers earlier to improve survival and save the NHS money.”
Professor Xin Lu, co-Director of the CRUK Oxford Centre and Director of the Oxford Centre for Early Cancer Detection, said “I am delighted that this national multi-site collaborative programme will be led from Oxford by Fergus Gleeson. Involving a world-class team of academics, clinicians, local and global industry, and patient representatives, this research is hugely important for accelerating lung cancer detection.”
The programme will also link to data from primary care to better assess risk in the general population and it is hoped the research will support a new set of standards for lung cancer screening.
The team that will be focusing on this include academics from Oxford University, Nottingham University, and Imperial College London; NHS clinicians from Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust, the Royal Marsden Hospital, the Royal Brompton Hospital, and University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust; and the Roy Castle Lung Cancer Foundation will join forces with three industrial partners (Roche Diagnostics, GE Healthcare and Optellum).
