DAYTON — The month of May is always designated as Women’s Health Month. It’s meant to encourage women to prioritize their well-being and schedule their preventive screenings.
News Center 7’s Letitia Perry learned how one of the screenings might someday change, thanks to new technology.
Women who are 40 or over are always encouraged to schedule a yearly mammogram. Those tests are read by two radiologists, and they sometimes lead to more testing to rule out an area of concern.
However, a large study out of Sweden suggests that process could someday become quicker and more accurate, thanks to artificial intelligence.
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Candy O’Terry said, “I grew up in a house where my mother was dying of breast cancer.”
O’Terry was just 18 years old when she lost her mother to breast cancer. She went on to become a beloved radio personality in Boston, but her fight against breast cancer went beyond the studio.
“The fight against breast cancer became my own personal charity. And I raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for the fight against breast cancer,” O’Terry said.
Then, she became a patient. “When I was diagnosed with breast cancer, I was terrified,” she said.
O’Terry’s diagnosis of Stage 1 Invasive Breast Cancer came during a routine mammogram, a test she’d had done many times.
“I had a doctor who literally kept on sending me back in for more pictures and more pictures. And I remember thinking she’s concerned about something,” O’Terry said.
She said the persistence of that doctor really left an impression on her. The urge to keep testing, just on a hunch that there was still a diagnosis to be made, but technology could soon offer a helping hand.
Dana Farber Medical Oncologist Dr. Harold Burstein said, “There’s been a lot of interest in using AI to look at all different kinds of x-rays, particularly mammograms.”
He has been tracking a Swedish study of more than 100,000 mammogram patients. Half of their mammograms were read by two radiologists. The rest were read by a single radiologist plus an A.I. program.
“The AI Module was able to detect actually slightly more cancers, so it missed fewer lesions. And secondly, it did that without increasing that callback rate,” Burstein said.
Burstein doesn’t yet know how soon this method could be rolled out to patients. And while he doesn’t believe AI will ever fully replace radiologists, he said it could be a boon to a field grappling with labor shortages.
“It would begin to be possible to have a remote AI van or equivalent that could do a mammogram, do a pretty good job at early detection of breast cancer and hopefully change the outcomes for women,” Burstein said.
O’Terry said, “I think about my daughter. I think about my grandchildren. And I think their road, should they ever go down it, will be paved so much more smoothly.”
O’Terry was treated with surgery and radiation. She’s in remission, and she is back to creating and thriving, thanks to the care she received and her early diagnosis.
“Let’s use AI-assisted mammography as a second set of eyes. Let’s use it as a tool to help us get there a little bit sooner. But that personal touch that the doctor had that day, that feeling that she had, let’s check again, is irreplaceable,” Burstein said.
He said AI is already being used for the early detection of breast cancer, but not during mammograms. In the U.S., more than 42,000 women die each year from breast cancer, according to the National Breast Cancer Foundation.
One in eight women will end up with breast cancer. But when caught in its earliest stages, the survival rate is 99 percent.
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