Artificial Intelligence in Endoscopy

Artificial intelligence (AI) is rapidly developing in various medical fields, and there is an increase in research performed in the field of gastrointestinal (GI) endoscopy. In particular, the advent of convolutional neural network, which is a class of deep learning method, has the potential to revolutionize the field of GI endoscopy, including esophagogastroduodenoscopy (EGD), capsule endoscopy (CE), and colonoscopy. A total of 149 original articles pertaining to AI (27 articles in esophagus, 30 articles in stomach, 29 articles in CE, and 63 articles in colon) were identified in this review. The main focuses of AI in EGD are cancer detection, identifying the depth of cancer invasion, prediction of pathological diagnosis, and prediction of Helicobacter pylori infection. In the field of CE, automated detection of bleeding sites, ulcers, tumors, and various small bowel diseases is being investigated. AI in colonoscopy has advanced with several patient-based prospective studies being conducted on the automated detection and classification of colon polyps. Furthermore, research on inflammatory bowel disease has also been recently reported. Most studies of AI in the field of GI endoscopy are still in the preclinical stages because of the retrospective design using still images. Video-based prospective studies are needed to advance the field. However, AI will continue to develop and be used in daily clinical practice in the near future. In this review, we have highlighted the published literature along with providing current status and insights into the future of AI in GI endoscopy.