An artificial intelligence (AI) system being evaluated by Oxford University Hospitals (OUH) NHS Foundation Trust, which could help improve diagnosis of prostate cancer, has been expanded to two other trusts.

The software formerly under evaluation by OUH alone - the Paige Prostate Suite - will now be evaluated at North Bristol NHS Trust and University Hospitals Coventry and Warwickshire (UHCW) NHS Trust.

Paige Prostate Suite is a computer-assisted diagnostic system adopted to improve prostate cancer detection.

The evaluation is part of the ARTICULATE PRO study, based at the University of Oxford's Nuffield Department of Surgical Sciences.

Each hospital involved in the trial uses different digital pathology scanners and information systems and serves distinct patient populations.

However, they are all adding Paige's AI applications to their standard of care to determine the potential to improve patient outcomes against a background of rising instances of prostate cancer.

Paige Prostate Suite comprises three AI applications, all designed to support pathologists in detecting, grading, and measuring tumours found in prostate biopsies and tissue samples.

Pathologists across the trusts are examining the impact of Paige Prostate Suite on their clinical decision-making, pathology service delivery, and utilisation of resources in a real world setting.

Professor Clare Verrill, OUH cellular pathology consultant and principal investigator of ARTICULATE PRO, said: "The central focus of ARTICULATE PRO is patients.

"We are striving towards our goal to safely and effectively ensure they benefit the most from powerful AI technology.

"With the multisite live use of The Paige Prostate Suite, we can systematically study benefits to patients in clinical settings."

Dr Jon Oxley, uropathologist and Bristol lead of ARTICULATE PRO, added: "I have studied the disease and progression of prostate cancer in clinical research for over 25 years, it is a significant advancement that Paige's AI system has achieved a level of validation and performance that allows safe and effective live clinical use.

"Using this system alongside our standard of care has the promise to increase efficiency and improve reproducibility of results for patients."

Dr Bidisa Sinha, uropathologist at UHCW, said: "We believe AI can help to improve the accuracy and consistency of grading cancer and assist in detection of small areas of cancer which are easy to miss.

"This is world-leading research being carried out at UHCW.

"We are proud to be a global leader in the field of digital and computational pathology."

This development is the latest achievement of the ARTICULATE PRO study, funded by the Accelerated Access Collaborative Artificial Intelligence in Health and Care Award, overseen by the Department of Health and Social Care.