Online Searches Can Be Used to Identify Cancer Victims

[Centurius]

 

Scientists working for Microsoft have found that by analyzing large amounts of search data they can in some cases identify users suffering from pancreatic cancer before even receiving a diagnosis. 

 

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Microsoft scientists have demonstrated that by analyzing large samples of search engine queries they may in some cases be able to identify internet users who are suffering from pancreatic cancer, even before they have received a diagnosis of the disease.

 

To identify these search terms researchers analyzed the specific behaviour of individuals diagnosed with the disease and then traced back to find previous search terms entered. Researchers have stated they can find up to five to fifteen percent of pancreatic cases with a false-positive rate of one in one-hundred thousand. While pancreatic cancer is lethal in most cases early detection can improve survival rates. 

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While five-year survival rates for pancreatic cancer are extremely low, early detection of the disease can prolong life in a very small percentage of cases. The study suggests that early screening can increase the five-year survival rate of pancreatic patients to 5 to 7 percent, from just 3 percent.

The researchers reported that they could identify from 5 to 15 percent of pancreatic cases with false positive rates of as low as one in 100,000. The researchers noted that false positives could lead to raised medical costs or create significant anxiety for people who later found out they were not sick.

 

 

The subjects in the research were anonymous with no personally identifying information being used so the people doing the searches could not be contacted. The trick now is to find out what to do with the information and to leverage it for other diseases as well.

 

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/08/technology/online-searches-can-identify-cancer-victims-study-finds.html?_r=1

 

We hear a lot about how companies are collecting all our data for commercial purposes and how in many cases those companies know more about us than we do ourselves, while there are risks to that this new research shows that it isn't all bad. If search engines such as Google and sites such as Facebook can be leveraged to identify deadly illnesses early on it could in the long-term save society a lot of money(treating a disease early on tends to be a lot cheaper than in a later stage or even when it has reached the terminal stage) as well as of course improving quality of life and life expectancy. As such I am looking forward to where this takes us in the future.

[Misanthrope]

Not just cancer patients: virtually anyone. People vastly underestimate and misunderstand the power of Metadata including certain overly enthusiastic Microsoft supporters. 

[Centurius]

57 minutes ago, huilun02 said:

Yes so people should give all their data to MS in hope they get diagnosed with a lifetime of expensive medical treatment.

This is data they already provide to Microsoft and Google anyway. All results are solely based on usage of search terms

[UnknownEngineer]

13 hours ago, huilun02 said:

Yes so people should give all their data to MS in hope they get diagnosed with a lifetime of expensive medical treatment.

Well, it's not like MS will just tell your doctors "OP has cancer, time to blast his insides with radiation am I right?" They can tell you to get checked, and you can choose to be checked or not checked. If you decide to get checked and the doctors find something wrong with you, then I would say MS's diagnosis helped.

 

But regardless of all that, it would be weird to just suddenly have cortana in Win 10 say "Dude, you have cancer, get help". I am given that diagnosis in WoT sometimes as well, it's weird there too.