AI eye checks can predict heart disease risk in less than minute, finds study

An artificial intelligence (AI) tool that scans eyes can accurately predict a person’s risk of heart disease in less than a minute, researchers say.

The breakthrough could enable ophthalmologists and other health workers to carry out cardiovascular screening on the high street using a camera – without the need for blood tests or blood pressure checks – according to the world’s largest study of its kind.

Researchers found AI-enabled imaging of the retina’s veins and arteries can specify the risk of cardiovascular disease, cardiovascular death and stroke.

They say the results could open the door to a highly effective, non-invasive test becoming available for people at medium to high risk of heart disease that does not have to be done in a clinic.

“This AI tool could let someone know in 60 seconds or less their level of risk,” the lead author of the study, Prof Alicja Rudnicka, told the Guardian. If someone learned their risk was higher than expected, they could be prescribed statins or offered another intervention, she said.

Speaking from a health conference in Copenhagen, Rudnicka, a professor of statistical epidemiology at St George’s, University of London, added: “It could end up improving cardiovascular health and save lives.”

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Source: The Guardian, 4 October 2022