Researchers reviewed 20 past studies to see if artificial intelligence (AI) could help doctors find traumatic chest injuries, like rib fractures, on medical scans. They compared doctors reading scans with AI assistance to doctors reading scans alone. The studies focused on adults, and 12 of them provided data on rib fracture detection.
The review found that AI assistance was linked to doctors being better at finding rib fractures. On average, the improvement in detection was modest. AI assistance was also linked to doctors taking less time to make a diagnosis, cutting the average time by about 99 seconds. The studies did not report any safety problems related to using the AI.
It is important to be cautious because the researchers rated the overall quality of the evidence as poor. This means the studies may have had flaws that make their results less reliable. The findings only apply to rib fractures, not necessarily other chest injuries. Readers should understand this is an early look at a new technology. More high-quality research is needed to create AI models that are truly useful for doctors and patients in everyday care.
