First FDA Approval for Clinical Cloud-Based Deep Learning in Healthcare

A gigantic stride towards the future of healthcare has arrived. On January 9th, 2017 in San Francisco, CA, a cloud-based medical imaging software known as Arterys received 510(k) clearances from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

The medical imaging platform that Arterys developed, called Arterys Cardio DL, is a wonderful accomplishment that will aid healthcare providers with diagnosing heart conditions. What is unique about this specific platform is that it is a cloud-based, self-teaching neural network. Every case Arterys Cardio DL encounters adds to its already vast pool of knowledge, making it increasingly accurate at detecting heart problems.

Additionally, the software can produce editable automated contours, enabling healthcare practitioners to see ventricular function within seconds. A similar feature is comprehensive anatomy as well as visualization and quantification of blood flow around the heart.

According to the founders of Arterys, Inc. – Fabien Beckers, Albert Hsiao, Shreyas Vasanawala, and John Axerio-Cilies – the platform originally started with 1,000 previously solved cases and was able to produce results for a new case in under 15 seconds. Compare this to the traditional 30 minutes to an hour of professional analysis, and one can already see the advantages of the Arterys system.

Furthermore, since Arterys is cloud-based, physicians that have linked to the network will be able to see and include data from all around the world. The more data the system receives, the more it will learn and improve its accuracy.

Yet, there has been some debate about the cloud-based platform in terms of patient privacy. For those who are concerned about patients being put at risk of identity theft, the founds of Arterys have also thought about this.

To quote CEO Fabien Beckers, “We tried to understand why the cloud wasn’t embraced in healthcare...and we found it was the fear of data piracy—you can be Google, GE, or any brand in the world, but a hospital isn’t going to feel comfortable sending your personal health information (PHI) to the cloud.”

Thus, did the founders decide to provide a solution: a PHI service that enables personal identifying information to be erased from the imaging data once it has been collected. Accredited system users at the hospital, such as the doctors or nurses, will need special authority to see the personal records. This means logging in with an assigned username and password, grabbing the imaging data and PHI from the secure server, and having the encrypted data reconstructed. Arterys, Inc will never receive data that can be used to identify individuals.

The clearance of an AI- and cloud-based computer imaging system by the FDA is a huge jump forward for incorporating data and analytics into healthcare. The acceptance of Arterys Cardio DL into hospitals will surely create thousands of possibilities for such technological advancements in the future so that physicians and other healthcare professionals can spot medical conditions sooner and provide patients comprehensive treatment quicker.