Deep learning for automatic detection and contouring of parotid gland tumors on MRI

Parotid gland tumors (PGTs) are often asymptomatic and an incidental finding on MRI that can be overlooked. We constructed an accurate artificial intelligence (AI) tool trained on fat-suppressed T2-weighted MRI to automatically identify patients with PGTs with an accuracy of 94.3% (99/105), a sensitivity of 94.0% (47/50) and a specificity of 94.5% (52/55). For identified PGT patients, automatic segmentations of the tumor and gland were performed and achieved dices of 77.2% and 86.3%, respectively. The proposed AI tool may assist radiologists by acting as a second pair of eyes to ensure incidental PGTs on MRI are not missed.