New AI-powered portable X-ray machines to help early detection and treatment of TB in the Philippines

The World Health Organization (WHO) marked World Tuberculosis Day on March 24. This year’s slogan is ‘Yes! We can end TB!’ Medics diagnosing tuberculosis (TB) in the Philippines are now using portable X-ray machines equipped with Computer-Aided Detection (CAD) software powered by artificial intelligence (AI) to accelerate the screening, early detection, and treatment. “It is a game changer, for the simple reason that this artificial intelligence are equipped to know the landmarks and then the parameters to check if an X-ray film has possessed or has a characteristic of a TB patient,” says Dr. Clarissa Dayrit-Halum, Technical Officer of the World Health Organization in the Philippines. “So, these are all installed in our machines, in our X-ray machines, and then the reading … The doctors will still evaluate all the readings of our AI. Don't get me wrong. They still read the results. It's just that it’s faster. The accuracy and specificity of our AI is very high, no less than 99%,” Dayrit-Halum adds. Currently, TB in the Philippines is a high burden. The country is in the number 3 slot globally, second to Indonesia. India holds the top spot with 26% of global cases, according to the WHO. “This mobile X-ray will help in the screening. It will accelerate the screening of the patients, and it will lead to a faster and even increase the volume of patients for a given regular time as compared to the conventional regular screening on X-rays,” says Dr. Camilio Cesar Baluyot. About 8.3 million people across the globe were newly diagnosed with TB in 2024. Not all infections are diagnosed, and the new numbers represent 78% of the estimated number of people who actually fell ill that year, according to WHO figures. WHO officials see the increase as an indication that screening and treatment are improving after health care disruptions during the COVID-19 pandemic. Globally, the number of deaths caused by TB fell in 2024 to 1.23 million, down from 1.25 million the year before. Tuberculosis is caused by bacteria that attack the lungs and is spread through the air when an infectious person coughs or sneezes. This article was provided by The Associated Press.