GPU-Powered Cellular Analysis Could Help Avoid Unnecessary Prostate Cancer Biopsies

Some 1.3 million men in North America each year undergo biopsies to determine whether they have prostate cancer. While these are ordered only after multiple tests indicate the possible presence of cancer, many are ultimately proven to have been unnecessary. Researchers at the University of Alberta hope to change that with a new testing method that relies on GPU computing — and which could prevent up to half of those biopsies from happening. The de facto screening method, known as a Prostate-Specific Antigen (PSA) test, is “not very reliable, and lots of men undergo biopsies for little benefit, and they risk infection and other side effects in the process,” said John Lewis, the Frank and Carla Sojonky Chair of Prostate Cancer Research funded by the Alberta Cancer Foundation.