Computer-aided diagnosis of breast cancer in ultrasonography images by deep learning

Biomarker profiling and integrating heterogeneous models for enhanced multi-grade breast cancer prognostication

BACKGROUND

Breast cancer remains a leading cause of female mortality worldwide, exacerbated by limited awareness, inadequate screening resources, and treatment options. Accurate and early diagnosis is crucial for improving survival rates and effective treatment.

OBJECTIVES

This study aims to develop an innovative artificial intelligence (AI) based model for predicting breast cancer and its various histopathological grades by integrating multiple biomarkers and subject age, thereby enhancing diagnostic accuracy and prognostication.

METHODS

A novel ensemble-based machine learning (ML) framework has been introduced that integrates three distinct biomarkers-beta-human chorionic gonadotropin (β-hCG), Programmed Cell Death Ligand 1 (PD-L1), and alpha-fetoprotein (AFP)-alongside subject age. Hyperparameter optimization was performed using the Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) algorithm, and minority oversampling techniques were employed to mitigate overfitting. The model's performance was validated through rigorous five-fold cross-validation.

RESULTS

The proposed model demonstrated superior performance, achieving a 97.93% accuracy and a 98.06% F1-score on meticulously labeled test data across diverse age groups. Comparative analysis showed that the model outperforms state-of-the-art approaches, highlighting its robustness and generalizability.

CONCLUSION

By providing a comprehensive analysis of multiple biomarkers and effectively predicting tumor grades, this study offers a significant advancement in breast cancer screening, particularly in regions with limited medical resources. The proposed framework has the potential to reduce breast cancer mortality rates and improve early intervention and personalized treatment strategies.

A systematic literature analysis of multi-organ cancer diagnosis using deep learning techniques

Cancer is becoming the most toxic ailment identified among individuals worldwide. The mortality rate has been increasing rapidly every year, which causes progression in the various diagnostic technologies to handle this illness. The manual procedure for segmentation and classification with a large set of data modalities can be a challenging task. Therefore, a crucial requirement is to significantly develop the computer-assisted diagnostic system intended for the initial cancer identification. This article offers a systematic review of Deep Learning approaches using various image modalities to detect multi-organ cancers from 2012 to 2023. It emphasizes the detection of five supreme predominant tumors, i.e., breast, brain, lung, skin, and liver. Extensive review has been carried out by collecting research and conference articles and book chapters from reputed international databases, i.e., Springer Link, IEEE Xplore, Science Direct, PubMed, and Wiley that fulfill the criteria for quality evaluation. This systematic review summarizes the overview of convolutional neural network model architectures and datasets used for identifying and classifying the diverse categories of cancer. This study accomplishes an inclusive idea of ensemble deep learning models that have achieved better evaluation results for classifying the different images into cancer or healthy cases. This paper will provide a broad understanding to the research scientists within the domain of medical imaging procedures of which deep learning technique perform best over which type of dataset, extraction of features, different confrontations, and their anticipated solutions for the complex problems. Lastly, some challenges and issues which control the health emergency have been discussed.

BraNet: a mobil application for breast image classification based on deep learning algorithms

Mobile health apps are widely used for breast cancer detection using artificial intelligence algorithms, providing radiologists with second opinions and reducing false diagnoses. This study aims to develop an open-source mobile app named "BraNet" for 2D breast imaging segmentation and classification using deep learning algorithms. During the phase off-line, an SNGAN model was previously trained for synthetic image generation, and subsequently, these images were used to pre-trained SAM and ResNet18 segmentation and classification models. During phase online, the BraNet app was developed using the react native framework, offering a modular deep-learning pipeline for mammography (DM) and ultrasound (US) breast imaging classification. This application operates on a client-server architecture and was implemented in Python for iOS and Android devices. Then, two diagnostic radiologists were given a reading test of 290 total original RoI images to assign the perceived breast tissue type. The reader's agreement was assessed using the kappa coefficient. The BraNet App Mobil exhibited the highest accuracy in benign and malignant US images (94.7%/93.6%) classification compared to DM during training I (80.9%/76.9%) and training II (73.7/72.3%). The information contrasts with radiological experts' accuracy, with DM classification being 29%, concerning US 70% for both readers, because they achieved a higher accuracy in US ROI classification than DM images. The kappa value indicates a fair agreement (0.3) for DM images and moderate agreement (0.4) for US images in both readers. It means that not only the amount of data is essential in training deep learning algorithms. Also, it is vital to consider the variety of abnormalities, especially in the mammography data, where several BI-RADS categories are present (microcalcifications, nodules, mass, asymmetry, and dense breasts) and can affect the API accuracy model.

Machine learning and new insights for breast cancer diagnosis

Breast cancer (BC) is the most prominent form of cancer among females all over the world. The current methods of BC detection include X-ray mammography, ultrasound, computed tomography, magnetic resonance imaging, positron emission tomography and breast thermographic techniques. More recently, machine learning (ML) tools have been increasingly employed in diagnostic medicine for its high efficiency in detection and intervention. The subsequent imaging features and mathematical analyses can then be used to generate ML models, which stratify, differentiate and detect benign and malignant breast lesions. Given its marked advantages, radiomics is a frequently used tool in recent research and clinics. Artificial neural networks and deep learning (DL) are novel forms of ML that evaluate data using computer simulation of the human brain. DL directly processes unstructured information, such as images, sounds and language, and performs precise clinical image stratification, medical record analyses and tumour diagnosis. Herein, this review thoroughly summarizes prior investigations on the application of medical images for the detection and intervention of BC using radiomics, namely DL and ML. The aim was to provide guidance to scientists regarding the use of artificial intelligence and ML in research and the clinic.

Public health implications of computer-aided diagnosis and treatment technologies in breast cancer care

Breast cancer remains a significant public health issue, being a leading cause of cancer-related mortality among women globally. Timely diagnosis and efficient treatment are crucial for enhancing patient outcomes, reducing healthcare burdens and advancing community health. This systematic review, following the PRISMA guidelines, aims to comprehensively synthesize the recent advancements in computer-aided diagnosis and treatment for breast cancer. The study covers the latest developments in image analysis and processing, machine learning and deep learning algorithms, multimodal fusion techniques and radiation therapy planning and simulation. The results of the review suggest that machine learning, augmented and virtual reality and data mining are the three major research hotspots in breast cancer management. Moreover, this paper discusses the challenges and opportunities for future research in this field. The conclusion highlights the importance of computer-aided techniques in the management of breast cancer and summarizes the key findings of the review.

Breast Cancer Diagnosis Based on IoT and Deep Transfer Learning Enabled by Fog Computing

Across all countries, both developing and developed, women face the greatest risk of breast cancer. Patients who have their breast cancer diagnosed and staged early have a better chance of receiving treatment before the disease spreads. The automatic analysis and classification of medical images are made possible by today's technology, allowing for quicker and more accurate data processing. The Internet of Things (IoT) is now crucial for the early and remote diagnosis of chronic diseases. In this study, mammography images from the publicly available online repository The Cancer Imaging Archive (TCIA) were used to train a deep transfer learning (DTL) model for an autonomous breast cancer diagnostic system. The data were pre-processed before being fed into the model. A popular deep learning (DL) technique, i.e., convolutional neural networks (CNNs), was combined with transfer learning (TL) techniques such as ResNet50, InceptionV3, AlexNet, VGG16, and VGG19 to boost prediction accuracy along with a support vector machine (SVM) classifier. Extensive simulations were analyzed by employing a variety of performances and network metrics to demonstrate the viability of the proposed paradigm. Outperforming some current works based on mammogram images, the experimental accuracy, precision, sensitivity, specificity, and f1-scores reached 97.99%, 99.51%, 98.43%, 80.08%, and 98.97%, respectively, on the huge dataset of mammography images categorized as benign and malignant, respectively. Incorporating Fog computing technologies, this model safeguards the privacy and security of patient data, reduces the load on centralized servers, and increases the output.

Overcoming limitation of dissociation between MD and MI classifications of breast cancer histopathological images through a novel decomposed feature-based knowledge distillation method

Magnification-independent (MI) classification is considered a promising method for detecting the histopathological images of breast cancer. However, it has too many parameters for real implementation due to dependence on input images in different magnification factors. In addition, magnification-dependent (MD) classification usually performs poorly on unseen samples, although it has lower input image sizes and fewer parameters. This paper proposes a novel method based on knowledge distillation (KD) to overcome the limitation of dissociation between MI classification and MD classification of breast cancer in histopathological images. The proposed KD method includes a pre-trained MI teacher model that is responsible for training an unprepared MD student model developed through only one magnification factor. In the proposed method, the decomposed feature maps of a teacher's intermediate layers are transferred as dark knowledge to a student. According to the experimental results, the student model developed through 40X images yielded accuracy rates of 99.41%, 99.26%, 99.14%, and 99.09% in response to unseen samples of 40X, 100X, 200X, and 400X images, respectively. Moreover, comparison results indicated the competitive performance of the proposed student model as opposed to the state-of-the-art method based on deep learning on BreakHis.

Ensemble Deep-Learning-Enabled Clinical Decision Support System for Breast Cancer Diagnosis and Classification on Ultrasound Images

Simple Summary

In the literature, there exist plenty of research works focused on the detection and classification of breast cancer. However, only a few works have focused on the classification of breast cancer using ultrasound scan images. Although deep transfer learning models are useful in breast cancer classification, owing to their outstanding performance in a number of applications, image pre-processing and segmentation techniques are essential. In this context, the current study developed a new Ensemble Deep-Learning-Enabled Clinical Decision Support System for the diagnosis and classification of breast cancer using ultrasound images. In the study, an optimal multi-level thresholding-based image segmentation technique was designed to identify the tumor-affected regions. The study also developed an ensemble of three deep learning models for feature extraction and an optimal machine learning classifier for breast cancer detection. The study offers a means of assisting radiologists and healthcare professionals in the breast cancer classification process.

Abstract

Clinical Decision Support Systems (CDSS) provide an efficient way to diagnose the presence of diseases such as breast cancer using ultrasound images (USIs). Globally, breast cancer is one of the major causes of increased mortality rates among women. Computer-Aided Diagnosis (CAD) models are widely employed in the detection and classification of tumors in USIs. The CAD systems are designed in such a way that they provide recommendations to help radiologists in diagnosing breast tumors and, furthermore, in disease prognosis. The accuracy of the classification process is decided by the quality of images and the radiologist’s experience. The design of Deep Learning (DL) models is found to be effective in the classification of breast cancer. In the current study, an Ensemble Deep-Learning-Enabled Clinical Decision Support System for Breast Cancer Diagnosis and Classification (EDLCDS-BCDC) technique was developed using USIs. The proposed EDLCDS-BCDC technique was intended to identify the existence of breast cancer using USIs. In this technique, USIs initially undergo pre-processing through two stages, namely wiener filtering and contrast enhancement. Furthermore, Chaotic Krill Herd Algorithm (CKHA) is applied with Kapur’s entropy (KE) for the image segmentation process. In addition, an ensemble of three deep learning models, VGG-16, VGG-19, and SqueezeNet, is used for feature extraction. Finally, Cat Swarm Optimization (CSO) with the Multilayer Perceptron (MLP) model is utilized to classify the images based on whether breast cancer exists or not. A wide range of simulations were carried out on benchmark databases and the extensive results highlight the better outcomes of the proposed EDLCDS-BCDC technique over recent methods.