Purpose

To assess whether the AI-based system mdbrain leads to efficiency gains when used in a real-life setting.

Materials & Methods

We asked 7 radiologists from 5 sites to assess subsequent radiological images as part of their daily routine, in total 285 (128/157 with/without the system’s support, resp.). Diagnosis (Dementia/MS) and reading time were documented. Additionally, the system’s subjective influence on the radiological report was surveyed.

Results

The median assessment time was significantly reduced by 25% when mdbrain was used (p < 0.001) equivalent to 1:56min. This reduction was significant for both diagnoses, and more pronounced for Dementia (-57%) compared to MS cases (-13%). We further observed a strong correlation between years of experience in radiology vs. reduction of reading times (R=0.76, p=0.05). Radiologists reported that mdbrain had a diagnostic impact in 118/128 AI-aided assessments. Among these cases, radiologist reported that mdbrain “reinforced their original assessment” in 76 cases, “enabled a clearer diagnosis” in 25 cases, “reported anomalies that could have been missed” in 7 cases, and “lead to confusion or less clear diagnosis” in 9 cases. Therefore, mdbrain had a positive diagnostic impact in 108 out of 128 cases (84%).

Discussion

In the majority of cases (84%) the AI-based system had a positive qualitative impact on the diagnostic process. In terms of efficiency, we observed a clear drop in reading times (median -25%) whereas the effect was more pronounced in Dementia (median -57%).