Optimizing skin cancer screening in the general population: can an artificial intelligence based smartphone app assist in the preselection of skin lesions for urgent medical advice ?

Skin cancer is the most frequent cancer diagnosed and its incidence will keep on rising in the next decade. Early detection of skin cancer is important for better outcome of the patient and to limit treatment cost for society. Persons with high skin cancer risk may be subjected to regular dermatology check. However a considerable number of skin cancers develop in the low-risk general population. The question is how we can offer early detection to these people. A systematic skin cancer screening in the population is not cost-effective. Based on previous research, we started a triage consultation for persons with 1 to 2 lesions of concern: changing mole, ugly duckling, new mole in adult, rapidly growing lesion, non-healing lesion, adviced by doctor. Skin cancer detection rate in this setting was at least 13% with 4% melanoma. This is 6 to 8-fold higher than reported by conventional skin cancer screening programs. The reason for this is that a preselection of lesions meeting specific criteria is done. This lesion-directed screening may be a way to make skin cancer screening in the general population (more) cost-effective. In this study we will investigate whether the Skinvision app can function as a preselection tool for lesions for which urgent medical advice is needed. Although this app is CE marked and is already promoted to the public, it’s performance and value in daily practice have been insufficiently studied and there is a need for independent research.