A deep learning approach to detection of oral cancer lesions from intra oral patient images: A preliminary retrospective study

Introduction

Oral squamous cell carcinomas (OSCC) seen in the oral cavity are a category of diseases for which dentists may diagnose and even cure. This study evaluated the performance of diagnostic computer software developed to detect oral cancer lesions in intra-oral retrospective patient images.

Materials and methods

Oral cancer lesions were labeled with CranioCatch labeling program (CranioCatch, Eskişehir, Turkey) and polygonal type labeling method on a total of 65 anonymous retrospective intraoral patient images of oral mucosa that were diagnosed with oral cancer histopathologically by incisional biopsy from individuals in our clinic. All images have been rechecked and verified by experienced experts. This data set was divided into training (n = 53), validation (n = 6) and test (n = 6) sets. Artificial intelligence model was developed using YOLOv5 architecture, which is a deep learning approach. Model success was evaluated with confusion matrix.

Results

When the success rate in estimating the images reserved for the test not used in education was evaluated, the F1, sensitivity and precision results of the artificial intelligence model obtained using the YOLOv5 architecture were found to be 0.667, 0.667 and 0.667, respectively.

Conclusions

Our study reveals that OCSCC lesions carry discriminative visual appearances, which can be identified by deep learning algorithm. Artificial intelligence shows promise in the prediagnosis of oral cancer lesions. The success rates will increase in the training models of the data set that will be formed with more images.