Q&A: The development of an AI solution to diagnose COVID-19 pneumonia – Med-Tech Innovation | Latest news for the medical device industry

In response to the COVID-19 outbreak, AI company BioMind developed a solution (BioMind AI-COVID) with the aim of diagnosing COVID-19 Pneumonia in a fast, accurate and cost-effective manner. It has since been deployed in hospitals across China, and is intent on expanding its footprint globally. Ian Bolland found out more.

Give us some background about BioMind – who developed it?

BioMind is an award-winning Artificial Intelligence company that specialises in creating predictive applications to assist doctors in their daily work. We have a dedicated team of machine learning engineers and medical experts from prestigious hospitals, and are committed to develop advanced AI technologies to help hospitals diagnose and treat medical conditions. 

BioMind has also been crowned the Champion in both the Techblazer Award 2019 and 19th Asia Pacific ICT Alliance Award. These highest accolades both nationally and internationally for ICT innovation are strong endorsements of how our technology can deliver unprecedented benefits to people.

What does BioMind actually do?

BioMind integrates deep learning technology with vast clinical knowledge to mimic how doctors diagnose medical images. It recommends diagnosis and automatically generates a report for doctors to review, all within seconds.  

Our range of products include our flagship product, BioMind, an assistive AI application that helps physicians diagnose various neurological conditions; Stroke AI, a clinical decision support system (CDSS) for stroke, and our latest application, AI-COVID to assist doctors in the early detection of COVID-19 infections.

The aim of our company is to develop useful and practical healthcare applications to relieve the burden on physicians and enhance patient management. 

Give us some insight into the technology, the kind of AI that’s used in it?

With regards to our latest application, AI-COVID, it was developed using state-of-the-art deep learning technology trained on non-contrast computed tomography scans confirmed by RT-PCT tests. The application can recognise patterns and features on the CT imaging scans that correspond to COVID-19 pneumonia and performs a quick triage to prioritise patient cases with severe conditions. This allows the limited pool of physicians to focus on the most critical conditions. 

How quickly can it diagnose COVID-19?

The strength of this assistive diagnostic AI application is in its speed and accuracy. With a short scan to report process within seconds and a sensitivity rate of over 99%, the adoption of AI-COVID will not only save time, suspected patients can also be isolated early, and the spread of the virus can be better contained. 

Are there are other respiratory conditions it can diagnose aside from COVID-19 Pneumonia?

The application is currently able to detect COVID-19 pneumonia on CT scans. In the near future, this will be upgraded to include detection of other pneumonia types, such as SARS, Avian flu, and other types of Bacterial and Viral Pneumonia. 

You’ve deployed the solution in over 30 hospitals in China, how quickly can it be deployed to other parts of the world?

Till date, the solution has been deployed in more than 140 hospitals in China. The time taken for deployment and integration to the hospital system is within a day. We are now scaling our solution to many parts of the world including Europe, Middle East and Asian countries to combat the outbreak. 

How long did this solution take to develop?

In response to the public health emergency, AI-COVID was developed in 20 days in collaboration with hospitals in ground zero.

This unique and powerful AI solution is trained on more than 20,000 CT scans which are clinically diagnosed with pneumonia. And the solution continues to improve with its continuous learning ability.

Anything else to add? 

With the worsening pandemic, we are committed to leverage the power of AI to empower physicians in their daily work. Its fast prediction ability allows for early detection of COVID19 cases so that the infected can be isolated early, limiting further spread. The combination of AI + CT also allows intelligent tracking of disease progression of patients, which aid in patient management and optimises the usage of medical resources.