Current landscape and potential future applications of artificial intelligence in medical physics and radiotherapy

Abstract

Artificial intelligence (AI) has seen tremendous growth over the past decade and stands to disrupts the medical industry. In medicine, this has been applied in medical imaging and other digitised medical disciplines, but in more traditional fields like medical physics, the adoption of AI is still at an early stage. Though AI is anticipated to be better than human in certain tasks, with the rapid growth of AI, there is increasing concerns for its usage. The focus of this paper is on the current landscape and potential future applications of artificial intelligence in medical physics and radiotherapy. Topics on AI for image acquisition, image segmentation, treatment delivery, quality assurance and outcome prediction will be explored as well as the interaction between human and AI. This will give insights into how we should approach and use the technology for enhancing the quality of clinical practice.

Keywords: Artificial intelligence; Medical physics; Radiotherapy; Image acquisition; Image segmentation; Treatment planning; Treatment delivery; Quality assurance

Core Tip: Artificial intelligence (AI) applications in medical physics and radiotherapy represent an important emerging area in AI applications in medicine. The most notable improvements for the many aspects of radiotherapy are the ability to provide an accurate result with consistency and eliminate inter-and intra-observer variations. Perspectives from physicians and medical physicists about the use of AI are presented, and suggestions of how human can co-exist with AI are made to better equip us for the future.