Last June, women around the world gained a major advance in the fight against breast cancer. Dr. Constance Lehman, a professor of radiology at Harvard Medical School, founded the company Clairity to reshape how women are screened for the disease. Clairity Breast received de novo authorization from the U.S. FDA as the first AI-based platform that can predict a woman’s risk of developing breast cancer in the next five years, based on a standard mammogram. Rather than following the crude, age-based recommendations for breast cancer screening, Clairity Breast takes into account years of research Lehman conducted to understand the risk factors that contribute to breast cancer, beyond family history and genetics, to give a woman a more precise, individualized report on the health of her breast tissue. She then gets a baseline score against which she can evaluate changes to her risk for the disease, and whether she needs more or less screening. Clairity is being rolled out at two hospitals so far, and Lehman aims to increase access and affordability for the screening test in the coming year.
