Development of a colon mapping algorithm for intelligent colonoscopy

Early detection is crucial to improve survival from colorectal diseases, including cancer with over 881000 deaths/year globally. Colonoscopy is the best method to identify disease and perform minor surgical interventions. Unfortunately, it comes with notable drawbacks: patient pain and long training required for operators. Moreover, a significant percentage of lesions (up to 20%) is often missed during colonoscopies, due to the lack of knowledge about the endoscope position and the impossibility to relate images with positioning.

This has a number of impacts including limited procedure accessibility, resulting in uncurbed demand for colonoscopy and enormous disease and economic burden. In the UK, an estimated 25% of patients wait more than 4 weeks to have their colonoscopy and more than 1 in 10 individuals are not attending colonoscopies even if tested positive by at-home tests. This is exacerbated by recent US Preventive Services Task Force guidelines recommending screening colonoscopy to begin at 45 instead of 50 years of age, increasing the potential screening population to 44 million individuals, in the US alone. Atlas Endoscopy is revolutionising colonoscopy by introducing the REN platform - a magnetic colonoscopy system composed of a robot and single-use endoscope. Our mission is to save lives by making colonoscopy more accessible to the population. We do this by improving on the drawbacks of conventional flexible endoscopes. After 15 years of academic research, more than 30 peer reviewed papers (including Nature and Science), extensive pre-clinical testing and the creation of a spin-off, Atlas Endoscopy is ready to transform that research into a product, creating the technology required to effectively and safely deploy REN in hospitals for the benefit of patients, clinicians and the wider healthcare system. In this grant, we want to go one step further and take advantage of the lastest AI results to create a virtual 3D map of the colon during navigation. This crucial information will help the operator to assess the amount and location of tissue visualised during navigation, and ensure the complete inspection of the mucosa. Moreover, the location of lesions will be mapped, providing an accurate indication for subsequent surgeries and a useful instrument to monitor the evolution of degenerative disesases.

This grant funding will be essential to increase the technology maturity, supporting the evolution of an innovative technology, developed in the UK and taiolred on the needs of the NHS.