IIT Roorkee’s X-Ray Scanning AI Can Detect COVID-19 In 3 To 5 Secs

Harin - Apr 27, 2020

Prof. Kamal Jain has made use of AI to develop a COVID-19 test using an X-Ray which would take only three to five seconds.

With more cases of COVID-19, what we need right now is more new and effective ways for detection. There are swab tests available; however, the process is uncomfortable while taking a long time, sometimes hours, for the results to come out.

However, this invention from an IIT Roorkee Prof. might change that. Prof. Kamal Jain has made use of AI to develop a COVID-19 test using an X-Ray. The process would take only three to five seconds.

Prof Kamal Jain

Kamal is a professor at the institute’s civil engineering department. According to Kamal, he has used data from over 60,000 chest x-rays to train the AI for effective virus detection.

The AI looks at the levels of chest congestion to detect whether a patient has COVID-19 or not.

In a statement, Kamal said that in the sample cases that he had analyzed, the most common cause of death had been severe pneumonia. COVID-19 cases with pneumonia were severe ones with all of the patients’ lungs being infected, rather than small parts.

For physicians, it would take time and experience to identify bilateral opacities, nature of clumps, the pattern of fluid build-up, and the overall arrangement in lungs for COVID-19, Kamal continued. However, the AI-based app can classify such patterns quickly and effectively.

X Ray Lungs — Data of over 60,000 chest x-rays used to train the AI for effective virus detection.

The AI can not only detect whether a patient is infected with COVID-19 or not but it also can identify the severity. Doctors will be notified if the patient needs special attention. The biggest advantage is that the app only needs minutes for lakhs of x-ray images processing. A patient is then classified, depending on the level of severity. From that, the hospital administration will decide which patient should be prioritized and put on a ventilator.

While the new AI system is an innovative way to deal with the rising of confirmed cases, it hasn’t received approval from the Indian Council of Medical Research or any other global medical institution.