Does artificial intelligence aid in the detection of different types of breast cancer?

Abstract

Background: On mammography many cancers may be missed even in retrospect either due to the breast density, the small size of the tumor or the subtle signs of cancer that are imperceptible. We aimed to compare the sensitivity of artificial intelligence (AI) to that of digital mammography in the detection of different types of breast cancer. Also, the sensitivity of AI in picking up the different breast cancer morphologies namely mass, pathological calcifications, asymmetry, and distortion was assessed. Tissue biopsy and pathology were used as the standard reference. The study included 123 female patients with 134 proved carcinoma. All patients underwent digital mammogram (DM) examination scanned with artificial intelligence algorithm. Results: AI achieved higher sensitivity than mammography in detecting malignant breast lesions. The sensitivity of AI was 96.6%, and false negative rate was 3.4%, while mammography sensitivity was 87.3% and false negative rate 12.7%. Our study showed AI performed better than mammography in detecting ductal carcinoma in situ and invasive lobular carcinoma with sensitivity (100% and 96.6%) vs (88.9% and 82.2%) respectively. AI was more sensitive to detect cancers presented with suspicious mass 95.2% vs 75%, suspicious calcifications 100% vs 86.5% and asymmetry and distortion 100% vs 84.6%, than mammography. Conclusions: AI showed potential values to overcome mammographic limitations in the detection of breast cancer even those with challenging morphology as invasive lobular carcinoma, ductal carcinoma in situ, tubular carcinoma and micropapillary carcinoma.