Study finds artificial intelligence accurately detects fractures on x-rays, alert human readers

A new study has found that artificial intelligence (AI) can help physicians in interpreting x-rays after an injury and suspected fracture.
"Our AI algorithm can quickly and automatically detect x-rays that are positive for fractures and flag those studies in the system so that radiologists can prioritize reading x-rays with positive fractures. The system also highlights regions of interest with bounding boxes around areas where fractures are suspected. This can potentially contribute to less waiting time at the time of hospital or clinic visit before patients can get a positive diagnosis of fracture," explained corresponding Ali Guermazi, MD, PhD, chief of radiology at VA Boston Healthcare System and Professor of Radiology & Medicine at Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM).
Fracture interpretation errors represents up to 24 percent of harmful diagnostic errors seen in the emergency department. Furthermore, inconsistencies in radiographic diagnosis of fractures are more common during the evening and overnight hours (5 p.m. to 3 a.m.), likely related to non-expert reading and fatigue.
The AI algorithm (AI BoneView), was trained on a very large number of X-rays from multiple institutions to detect fractures of the limbs, pelvis, torso and lumbar spine and rib cage. Expert human readers (musculoskeletal radiologists, who are subspecialized radiology doctors after receiving focused training on reading bone x-rays) defined the gold standard in this study and compared the performance of human readers with and without AI assistance.
https://pubs.rsna.org/doi/10.1148/radiol.210937
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