Google DeepMind is planning to enter the field of medical diagnosis by using artificial intelligence (AI). The company has partnered with the Moorsfield Eye Hospital in England to use AI to effectively detect the cases of ocular eye diseases in patients and to prevent the increasing cases of the diseases.
The partnership between the hospital and Google DeepMind aims to quickly and effectively treat the eye conditions by helping doctors in making a correct and timely diagnosis. In addition, the company hopes to help people avoid preventable diseases.
Each week, Moorsfield Eyes Hospital conducts thousands of eye scans, which is a non-invasive procedure that generates tonnes of useful information. However, doctors usually take a huge amount of time analyzing those scans because of the depth of information and complexity involved. This, in turn, delays the treatment of the patients.
This is where Google DeepMind can come into play. It can use AI to study the vast amount of information and help researchers understand it. That way, doctors and researchers can put the data together and use it for making a quick, effective and correct diagnosis to provide the best possible treatment to the patients.
To take Google DeepMind's help, the company has decided to provide more than 1 million anonymized eye scans to the company for analysis. The eye scans are historical and therefore, none of the patients currently being treated at the hospital will be affected by the study results. The company will use the scans to and train algorithms to identify the early signs of the disease and other information that doctors usually look for in a patient.
Doctors believe that the collaboration would allow much earlier detection and diagnosis of the eye-related diseases that may even cause blindness in individuals. As a result, much treatment and other forms of intervention can be carried out well before time.
