Wenhui Zhou aims to personalize DCIS management with multimodal AI
By combining imaging with complementary physician observations and test results, Wenhui Zhou, MD, PhD’s research aims to guide surgical decisions and preoperative planning.
Ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS) is an early-stage, non-invasive breast cancer that has variable potential for invasive progression. In Dr. Zhou’s 2023 R&E Foundation grant for “Prediction of Occult Invasive Breast Cancer in Women with Ductal Carcinoma In Situ Using Multitask Deep Learning,” he and his team hypothesized that imaging and clinicopathological data could improve the ability to differentiate between pure DCIS and DCIS with invasive breast cancer.
“Our research aims to develop a personalized risk assessment using multiparametric MRI and clinicopathological data to better predict invasive disease,” Dr. Zhou said in the RSNA news article “Toward Personalized DCIS Care With Multimodal AI.” “This data-driven approach could revolutionize risk-adaptive treatment strategies and identify patients who can be safely managed with active surveillance instead of upfront surgery.”
Dr. Zhou continues to build on this research at UW–Madison. He and his team are using a multitask deep learning approach to develop the framework, data infrastructure, and methodology for bringing together and analyzing multidisciplinary data from routine diagnostic workup. The AI model can integrate quantitative MRI data and clinicopathological data for risk assessment of DCIS.
This tool could change the shared decision-making between surgeons and patients when determining whether their DCIS diagnosis can be managed with a watchful waiting approach rather than immediate surgery.
“Once we validate the model to automate DCIS characterization directly from breast MRI, the second goal of this project is to develop and validate a risk assessment score using multimodal data from preoperative assessment, for predicting invasive breast cancer in DCIS,” Dr. Zhou said. “The end product will be a user-friendly, clinically actionable, point-of-care tool for radiologists, surgeons and oncologists to estimate the likelihood of invasive breast cancer for individual patients diagnosed with DCIS.”
Learn more about Dr. Zhou’s research in the RSNA news article.