Every year around the world, more than 750,000 people die from parasite-borne diseases such as malaria and those linked to contaminated food and water.
Calvin Lung, a student in (COPH), wants to reduce these numbers by using artificial intelligence (AI) as a tool in fighting what scientists say could and should be preventable illnesses.
“With AI, we can more quickly screen specimens for the presence of parasites and because our results affect treatment options, we confirm the species identification with traditional microscopy,’’ he said. “We validated the platform so that we can trust the results.’’
Lung is working on his DrPH online while engaged as a senior microbiologist at Contra Costa County Public Health Laboratory in Martinez, CA. − the first public health laboratory in the country to utilize AI-assisted microscopy for the detection of ova and parasites in stool specimens. He recently attended two Association of Public Health Laboratories (APHL) conferences in Baltimore and Atlanta, annual events that bring together leaders, scientists and the public health laboratory community to share issues, trends and best practices.
Calvin Lung presenting his research at the Association of Public Health Laboratories conference in Baltimore. (Photo courtesy of Lung)
In the first conference, he participated in a roundtable discussion on testing methodologies and workflows from different laboratories and in the second event he presented a poster on the use of AI to help screen stool specimens for parasites.
His poster, “Validation of the Techcyte/Pramana Platform for the Detection of Parasites in Stool Specimens in a County Public Health Laboratory,’’ focused on how AI can speed up processes to make detecting and treating parasites more efficient.
The study evaluated an AI-assisted workflow using parasitology algorithms called Techcyte alongside digital slide scanners known as Pramana. They demonstrate how AI provides faster, highly sensitive screening for intestinal protozoa compared to manual microscopy, and together they help verify evidence with greater confidence.
Bringing AI into the lab has a number of benefits, according to Lung’s research:
- Automated screening: Instead of relying entirely on manual microscopy, the Pramana imager digitizes slides and the Techcyte software classifies parasitic objects.
- Technologist verification: The AI tool acts as a pre-screening assistant. Slides flagged as positive by the computer vision system are reviewed by a licensed public health microbiologist.
- Increased sensitivity: Large-scale AI validation studies are proving this methodology to be robust, achieving 98% positive agreement with manual confirmation while frequently catching low-level parasitic infections missed by traditional human review.
- Efficiency: Automated slide reading and AI flagging help county and state public health laboratories manage high-volume testing without compromising turnaround times or diagnostic quality.
AI serves as a valuable assistant at a time when laboratories across the country are losing federal funding and staff. By streamlining the manual, time-intensive processes done by people at basic levels, the technology allows highly trained professionals to focus on more specialized work.
“Much of the work in the laboratory is performed manually,’’ Lung said. “AI-assisted instruments may take away some of the mental burden and allow staff to spend less time on the repetitious work and focus more time and energy on critical tasks.’’
“With the recent funding cuts, those in the public health field are often asked to do more with less. In the last couple of years, two very experienced parasitologists (at the California lab) left so we had to innovate in order to stay on top of our turnaround time while still maintaining the quality of our work.’’