AI tool could speed up diagnosis of coeliac disease, research finds

Artificial intelligence could speed up the diagnosis of coeliac disease, a Cambridge study suggests.

- Anna Bawden

It can take years to confirm a patient has developed the autoimmune condition, which affects almost 700,000 people in the UK.

Caused by consuming gluten in wheat, rye and barley, coeliac symptoms include stomach cramps, diarrhoea, skin rashes, weight loss, fatigue and anaemia.

Most adults are diagnosed through a blood test for the presence of antibodies to gluten and by a biopsy of the small intestine.

Now scientists at the University of Cambridge have developed an AI tool that could bypass this process after being trained on more than 4,000 images from five hospitals.

According to the study published in the New England Journal of Medicine, it was as effective as a pathologist in diagnosing coeliac disease and substantially faster.