This AI software from DeepMind can detect eye diseases as well as a doctor

Over the part few years, the British Artificial Intelligence (AI) company **DeepMind** has been working on a system to spot symptoms of over 50 eye diseases, and can now successfully diagnose patients of these illnesses as accurately as an experienced doctor could, according to a study. The breakthrough comes as a result of the company’s partnership with London’s Moorfields Eye Hospital researchers, NHS Foundation Trust and scientists at the University College London’s Institute of Ophthalmology. The AI software was programmed with deep learning, and their research published in the journal Nature Medicine. Their paper also describes how deep learning can be used to comprehend complex and layered 3D optical coherence tomography (OCT) scans from patients, which help ophthalmologists identify defects in the many layers of the eye’s retina. [caption id=“attachment_4470349” align=“alignnone” width=“1280”] Representational image[/caption] While there have been other AI systems designed to study the 3D tissue map and make learned decisions about what the diseases could be, DeepMind’s AI software can also determine how urgently the patient needs to be attended to and treatment options. So far, the AI system has been trained with close to 15,000 scans from 7,600-odd patients. The AI can currently identify 50 unique eye-defects, with an accuracy of nearly 95 percent. This, according to DeepMind, makes the AI as effective as a highly-experienced eye specialist. The researchers will carry out clinical trials in the near future to verify the accuracy and scope of the technology in patient care.