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The early diagnosis of cancer in Barrett’s esophagus is crucial for improving the prognosis. However, identifying Barrett’s esophagus-related neoplasia (BERN) is challenging, even for experts [1]. Four-quadrant biopsies may improve the detection of neoplasia, but they can be associated with sampling errors. The application of artificial intelligence (AI) to the assessment of Barrett’s esophagus could improve the diagnosis of BERN, and this has been demonstrated in both preclinical and clinical studies [2] [3].
In this video demonstration, we show the accurate detection and delineation of BERN in two patients ([Video 1]). In part 1, the AI system detects a mucosal cancer about 20 mm in size and accurately delineates the lesion in both white-light and narrow-band imaging. In part 2, a small island of BERN with high-grade dysplasia is detected and delineated in white-light, narrow-band, and texture and color enhancement imaging. The video shows the results using a transparent overlay of the mucosal cancer in real time as well as a full segmentation preview. Additionally, the optical flow allows for the assessment of endoscope movement, something which is inversely related to the reliability of the AI prediction. We demonstrate that multimodal imaging can be applied to the AI-assisted detection and segmentation of even small focal lesions in real time.
Background
This study evaluated the effect of an artificial intelligence (AI)-based clinical decision support system on the performance and diagnostic confidence of endoscopists in their assessment of Barrett’s esophagus (BE).
Methods
96 standardized endoscopy videos were assessed by 22 endoscopists with varying degrees of BE experience from 12 centers. Assessment was randomized into two video sets: group A (review first without AI and second with AI) and group B (review first with AI and second without AI). Endoscopists were required to evaluate each video for the presence of Barrett’s esophagus-related neoplasia (BERN) and then decide on a spot for a targeted biopsy. After the second assessment, they were allowed to change their clinical decision and confidence level.
Results
AI had a stand-alone sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy of 92.2%, 68.9%, and 81.3%, respectively. Without AI, BE experts had an overall sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy of 83.3%, 58.1%, and 71.5%, respectively. With AI, BE nonexperts showed a significant improvement in sensitivity and specificity when videos were assessed a second time with AI (sensitivity 69.8% [95%CI 65.2%–74.2%] to 78.0% [95%CI 74.0%–82.0%]; specificity 67.3% [95%CI 62.5%–72.2%] to 72.7% [95%CI 68.2%–77.3%]). In addition, the diagnostic confidence of BE nonexperts improved significantly with AI.
Conclusion
BE nonexperts benefitted significantly from additional AI. BE experts and nonexperts remained significantly below the stand-alone performance of AI, suggesting that there may be other factors influencing endoscopists’ decisions to follow or discard AI advice.
Aims
Eosinophilic esophagitis (EoE) is easily missed during endoscopy, either because physicians are not familiar with its endoscopic features or the morphologic changes are too subtle. In this preliminary paper, we present the first attempt to detect EoE in endoscopic white light (WL) images using a deep learning network (EoE-AI).
Methods
401 WL images of eosinophilic esophagitis and 871 WL images of normal esophageal mucosa were evaluated. All images were assessed for the Endoscopic Reference score (EREFS) (edema, rings, exudates, furrows, strictures). Images with strictures were excluded. EoE was defined as the presence of at least 15 eosinophils per high power field on biopsy. A convolutional neural network based on the ResNet architecture with several five-fold cross-validation runs was used. Adding auxiliary EREFS-classification branches to the neural network allowed the inclusion of the scores as optimization criteria during training. EoE-AI was evaluated for sensitivity, specificity, and F1-score. In addition, two human endoscopists evaluated the images.
Results
EoE-AI showed a mean sensitivity, specificity, and F1 of 0.759, 0.976, and 0.834 respectively, averaged over the five distinct cross-validation runs. With the EREFS-augmented architecture, a mean sensitivity, specificity, and F1-score of 0.848, 0.945, and 0.861 could be demonstrated respectively. In comparison, the two human endoscopists had an average sensitivity, specificity, and F1-score of 0.718, 0.958, and 0.793.
Conclusions
To the best of our knowledge, this is the first application of deep learning to endoscopic images of EoE which were also assessed after augmentation with the EREFS-score. The next step is the evaluation of EoE-AI using an external dataset. We then plan to assess the EoE-AI tool on endoscopic videos, and also in real-time. This preliminary work is encouraging regarding the ability for AI to enhance physician detection of EoE, and potentially to do a true “optical biopsy” but more work is needed.
Aims
Celiac disease (CD) is a complex condition caused by an autoimmune reaction to ingested gluten. Due to its polymorphic manifestation and subtle endoscopic presentation, the diagnosis is difficult and thus the disorder is underreported. We aimed to use deep learning to identify celiac disease on endoscopic images of the small bowel.
Methods
Patients with small intestinal histology compatible with CD (MARSH classification I-III) were extracted retrospectively from the database of Augsburg University hospital. They were compared to patients with no clinical signs of CD and histologically normal small intestinal mucosa. In a first step MARSH III and normal small intestinal mucosa were differentiated with the help of a deep learning algorithm. For this, the endoscopic white light images were divided into five equal-sized subsets. We avoided splitting the images of one patient into several subsets. A ResNet-50 model was trained with the images from four subsets and then validated with the remaining subset. This process was repeated for each subset, such that each subset was validated once. Sensitivity, specificity, and harmonic mean (F1) of the algorithm were determined.
Results
The algorithm showed values of 0.83, 0.88, and 0.84 for sensitivity, specificity, and F1, respectively. Further data showing a comparison between the detection rate of the AI model and that of experienced endoscopists will be available at the time of the upcoming conference.
Conclusions
We present the first clinical report on the use of a deep learning algorithm for the detection of celiac disease using endoscopic images. Further evaluation on an external data set, as well as in the detection of CD in real-time, will follow. However, this work at least suggests that AI can assist endoscopists in the endoscopic diagnosis of CD, and ultimately may be able to do a true optical biopsy in live-time.
In this study, we aimed to develop an artificial intelligence clinical decision support solution to mitigate operator-dependent limitations during complex endoscopic procedures such as endoscopic submucosal dissection and peroral endoscopic myotomy, for example, bleeding and perforation. A DeepLabv3-based model was trained to delineate vessels, tissue structures and instruments on endoscopic still images from such procedures. The mean cross-validated Intersection over Union and Dice Score were 63% and 76%, respectively. Applied to standardised video clips from third-space endoscopic procedures, the algorithm showed a mean vessel detection rate of 85% with a false-positive rate of 0.75/min. These performance statistics suggest a potential clinical benefit for procedure safety, time and also training.
Background and aims: The accurate differentiation between T1a and T1b Barrett’s cancer has both therapeutic and prognostic implications but is challenging even for experienced physicians. We trained an Artificial Intelligence (AI) system on the basis of deep artificial neural networks (deep learning) to differentiate between T1a and T1b Barrett’s cancer white-light images.
Methods: Endoscopic images from three tertiary care centres in Germany were collected retrospectively. A deep learning system was trained and tested using the principles of cross-validation. A total of 230 white-light endoscopic images (108 T1a and 122 T1b) was evaluated with the AI-system. For comparison, the images were also classified by experts specialized in endoscopic diagnosis and treatment of Barrett’s cancer.
Results: The sensitivity, specificity, F1 and accuracy of the AI-system in the differentiation between T1a and T1b cancer lesions was 0.77, 0.64, 0.73 and 0.71, respectively. There was no statistically significant difference between the performance of the AI-system and that of human experts with sensitivity, specificity, F1 and accuracy of 0.63, 0.78, 0.67 and 0.70 respectively.
Conclusion: This pilot study demonstrates the first multicenter application of an AI-based system in the prediction of submucosal invasion in endoscopic images of Barrett’s cancer. AI scored equal to international experts in the field, but more work is necessary to improve the system and apply it to video sequences and in a real-life setting. Nevertheless, the correct prediction of submucosal invasion in Barret´s cancer remains challenging for both experts and AI.
Effect of AI on performance of endoscopists to detect Barrett neoplasia: A Randomized Tandem Trial
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Background and study aims
To evaluate the effect of an AI-based clinical decision support system (AI) on the performance and diagnostic confidence of endoscopists during the assessment of Barrett's esophagus (BE).
Patients and Methods
Ninety-six standardized endoscopy videos were assessed by 22 endoscopists from 12 different centers with varying degrees of BE experience.
The assessment was randomized into two video sets: Group A (review first without AI and second with AI) and group B (review first with AI and second without AI). Endoscopists were required to evaluate each video for the presence of Barrett's esophagus-related neoplasia (BERN) and then decide on a spot for a targeted biopsy. After the second assessment, they were allowed to change their clinical decision and confidence level.
Results
AI had a standalone sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy of 92.2%, 68.9%, and 81.6%, respectively. Without AI, BE experts had an overall sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy of 83.3%, 58.1 and 71.5%, respectively. With AI, BE nonexperts showed a significant improvement in sensitivity and specificity when videos were assessed a second time with AI (sensitivity 69.7% (95% CI, 65.2% - 74.2%) to 78.0% (95% CI, 74.0% - 82.0%); specificity 67.3% (95% CI, 62.5% - 72.2%) to 72.7% (95 CI, 68.2% - 77.3%). In addition, the diagnostic confidence of BE nonexperts improved significantly with AI.
Conclusion
BE nonexperts benefitted significantly from the additional AI. BE experts and nonexperts remained below the standalone performance of AI, suggesting that there may be other factors influencing endoscopists to follow or discard AI advice.
