Artificial Intelligence in Colorectal Cancer: From Patient Screening over Tailoring Treatment Decisions to Identification of Novel Biomarkers

Research output: Contribution to journalReview articleContributedpeer-review

Contributors

Abstract

Background: Artificial intelligence (AI) is increasingly entering and transforming not only medical research but also clinical practice. In the last 10 years, new AI methods have enabled computers to perform visual tasks, reaching high performance and thereby potentially supporting and even outperforming human experts. This is in particular relevant for colorectal cancer (CRC), which is the 3rd most common cancer type in general, as along the CRC patient journey many complex visual tasks need to be performed: from endoscopy over imaging to histopathology; the screening, diagnosis, and treatment of CRC involve visual image analysis tasks. Summary: In all these clinical areas, AI models have shown promising results by supporting physicians, improving accuracy, and providing new biological insights and biomarkers. By predicting prognostic and predictive biomarkers from routine images/slides, AI models could lead to an improved patient stratification for precision oncology approaches in the near future. Moreover, it is conceivable that AI models, in particular together with innovative techniques such as single-cell or spatial profiling, could help identify novel clinically as well as biologically meaningful biomarkers that could pave the way to new therapeutic approaches. Key Messages: Here, we give a comprehensive overview of AI in colorectal cancer, describing and discussing these developments as well as the next steps which need to be taken to incorporate AI methods more broadly into the clinical care of CRC.

Details

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)331-344
Number of pages14
JournalDigestion : international journal of gastroenterology
Volume105
Issue number5
Publication statusPublished - 1 Sept 2024
Peer-reviewedYes

External IDs

PubMed 38865982

Keywords

Sustainable Development Goals

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Keywords

  • Artificial intelligence, Biomarkers, Colorectal cancer, Deep learning, Oncology