Vuno said Wednesday that it has won the approval from the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety for VUNO Med-Lung CT AI, the nation's first computed tomography solution based on artificial intelligence.

As the CT solution detects pulmonary nodules with excellent performance, it is expected to serve as a useful supplementary tool for diagnosing lung cancer for medical professionals, the company said. Three large hospitals have conducted clinical trials with VUNO Med-Lung CT AI and got regulator’s approval based on their results, it added.

According to the results of tests conducted at Kangbuk Samsung Hospital, National Cancer Center, and Asan Medical Center, the solution proved excellent clinical usefulness by showing a high detection rate compared to a low false-positive rate, Vuno said in a news release.

An image of lung captured by Vuno’s VUNO Med-Lung CT AI

Vuno's AI solution is the first computer-based detection software in Korea to detect pulmonary nodules based on artificial intelligence in chest CT images, and the performance in detection is the world's best. A pulmonary nodule is a round lung marking with a size of fewer than three centimeters, which could be the sign of an early stage of lung cancer.

In August 2019, a national lung cancer screening project began to perform chest CT imaging in high-risk groups of lung cancer. The goal was to increase the survival rate of lung cancer patients by finding cancer in the early period. However, there have been concerns about the radiologists' workload due to increased test volumes and complicated reading standards.

The AI solution provides quantitative pulmonary nodule information such as diameter and size, which are difficult to measure based on the patient chest CT image, within a minute, the company said.

The solution is also expected to help detect nodules that can be easily missed out during the reading process and improve the work accuracy and efficiency of radiologists, it added.

"VUNO Med-Lung CT AI is the only AI-based chest CT solution in Korea that showed high detection performance of lung cancer through a complicated verification process in various domestic clinical environments," Vuno CEO Kim Hyun-jun said.

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