Researchers at St. Mary's Seoul Hospital have developed artificial intelligence software that can predict kidney cancer recurrence.

Professor Hong Seung-hoo of the Department of Urology led the research to develop the algorithm, which predicts recurrence probability in five to 10 years after kidney cancer surgery using AI machine learning.

Hong and his team expect that the AI software will become the basis for establishing strategies to improve patients' prognosis as kidney cancer has no established big data platform locally and globally, the hospital said in a news release on Monday.

In developing the software, the team used the Korea Renal Cell Carcinoma (KORCC) database collected from eight local medical institutions and extracted 31 variables that affect renal cancer recurrence among 6,849 patients analyzed by the primary statistical method. The team selected 10 variables that significantly affected actual clinical trials and applied them to eight types of machine learning algorithms.

As a result, it confirmed that the Naive Bayes algorithm result was the best among applied machine learning algorithms and improved the algorithm's performance by optimizing the parameters of the Naive Bayes algorithm.

The predicted value of recurrence was 0.84 in five years after surgery and 0.79 in 10 years.

"We believe the developed algorithm will help clinicians manage the prognosis of patients after renal cancer surgery and establish personalized treatment strategies," Professor Hong said.

Kidney cancer has become prevalent in Korea recently. The cancer is hard to detect as there is only a 10-15 percent chance of all symptoms, such as pain in the side, bloody stools, and abdominal masses, appear in a patient.

Recurrence after renal cancer surgery usually occurs between one to two years after surgery, but there are recurrence reports even after 15 years. Therefore, a follow-up examination for recurrence or progression after surgery is essential.

If the cancer size is larger than 7 centimeters or a risk factor exists for metastasis, such as lymph node metastasis or renal vein invasion, the recurrence rate is high, and metastasis mainly occurs in the lungs, bones, and liver. Even if it recurs, there are few symptoms that a patient feels, so regular checkups are important.

The results of the research were published in the March edition of JMIR MEDICAL INFORMATICS.