Apps for scanning suspicious skin spots do not always provide the correct diagnosis. Places are often wrongly seen as suspicious. The Consumers’ Association concludes this on the basis of a test of three skin apps. 21 test subjects participated in that study.
The subjects checked a total of 45 skin patches with the skin apps Skin Monitor, Medgic and SkinVision. Then two dermatologists assessed the spots. According to the dermatologists, two of the 45 spots were skin cancer. In Huidmonitor and SkinVision, these spots also emerged as suspicious. Medgic gave an unclear result for these two spots. SkinVision mistook many more spots for skin cancer.
At Skin Monitor, the app does not assess whether a spot is suspicious. That is left to the user. He must compare a photo of the suspect with sample photos. The judgment is often good, better than with SkinVision.
The subjects received many unclear results with the Medgic app. For example, a birthmark was diagnosed as ‘good or malignant’. Sometimes the app gave four diagnoses for a spot.
Ultimately, 16 of the 21 participants indicated that they preferred to go to the doctor with a suspicious spot.
By: ANP
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