Artificial intelligence can predict whether breast cancer will spread


Researchers from King's College London, in the United Kingdom, achieved a significant advance in the field of oncology: they developed an artificial intelligence (AI) model capable of predicting the risk of breast cancer metastasis.

The study focused on patients with triple-negative breast cancer, a type of cancer in which cancer cells lack three key receptors that help their growth: estrogen receptor, progesterone receptor and HER2 receptor.

The absence of these receptors makes treatment more challenging, as specific therapeutic options for these receptors are not effective. In addition, triple negative breast cancer is most likely to recur or spread in the first few years after treatment, known as secondary or metastatic breast cancer.

The new AI model was developed from testing more than 5,000 lymph nodes donated by generous patients to biobanks. The technology assesses the immune response by measuring the lymph nodes' ability to filter out foreign substances, including cancer cells and infections.

The researchers found that, based on markers related to the immune response, it is possible to predict the likelihood of cancer metastasizing to other parts of the body, even when the cancer cells have not yet spread to the lymph nodes.