Schizophrenia may not be as common as other mental disorders, but it can have a devastating impact on a person¡¯s life. However, research by IBM and the University of Alberta may have now discovered a way to diagnose the onset of the disease early, using a simple MRI scan and an AI.
MRI¡¯s show the blood flow going to various parts of the brain, which IBM¡¯s neural network can analyse to pinpoint markers for the medical condition.?
¡°This unique, innovative multidisciplinary approach opens new insights and advances our understanding of the neurobiology of schizophrenia, which may help to improve the treatment and management of the disease,¡± Dr Serdar Dursun, a Professor of Psychiatry & Neuroscience with the University of Alberta, said in a press release.
The team first trained its AI with a dataset of 95 brains scans, which included both patients with schizophrenia and those who were healthy. The scans were administered as the patients completed an audio-based exercise. The neural network was then able to pinpoint schizophrenia sufferers based on the blood flow to their brain with a 74 percent accuracy.
¡°We've discovered a number of significant abnormal connections in the brain that can be explored in future studies,¡± Dursun said, ¡°and AI-created models bring us one step closer to finding objective neuroimaging-based patterns that are diagnostic and prognostic markers of schizophrenia.¡±