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AA Andrew Armstrong On The People's Pharmacy

“Prostate cancer is the first cancer to have an AI biomarker to help make decisions in a cancer patient. It's not taking-over-the-world type AI. It's helping you live longer and better.”

The People's Pharmacy · Health & Longevity · October 2026

“Prostate cancer is the first cancer to have an AI biomarker to help make decisions in a cancer patient. It's not taking-over-the-world type AI. It's helping you live longer and better.” — Andrew Armstrong, The People's Pharmacy

Context

Joe Graedon asked whether AI is playing a role in cancer care. Armstrong describes an AI digital-pathology test used in clinic that can help some men avoid hormone therapy they don't need.

Transcript

The People's Pharmacy Around 21:32 into the episode
Terry Graedon

And of course, none of us actually knows how many more years we have to live. But if we expect to live at least 10 years, we could do the screening and get some benefit from it.

Joe Graedon

…a little bit about AI, because artificial intelligence is like taking over everything. And I talk to radiologists on a regular basis and they say, yeah, we are using AI sort of as a double check or a verification. What about when it comes to breast cancer and prostate cancer? Is AI playing a role?

Andrew Armstrong

So I'm happy to report that prostate cancer is the first cancer to have an AI biomarker to help make decisions in a cancer patient. So the first was for intermediate risk men who have chosen radiation. We have an AI digital pathology biomarker that's been developed and validated in thousands of patients that we now use in our clinics that can help you not get hormonal therapy, for example, which is very popular, you know, to avoid if you don't need it. So it helps spare toxicity. We've also developed AI pathology biomarkers that can inform on treatment intensification. So do you need two hormonal therapies instead of one? So all that is very helpful. It's not taking over the world type AI. You know, it's helping you live longer and better. Right.

Terry Graedon

I would like to ask, right while we're here, while you've just talked about it, when you say hormonal therapy, what do you mean?

Andrew Armstrong

It's a great question, Terry. It's actually anti-hormonal therapy when we talk about these cancers because prostate cancer is driven by the male hormone, testosterone, breast cancer often driven by the female hormone, estrogen or progesterone. And so when we're talking about hormonal therapy, we're…

Joe Graedon

So anti-androgens for men, that is to say, blocking testosterone or preventing its formation. What about in women? We hear a lot about anti-estrogens, especially after surgery.

Speaker names come from our own diarization. The position is estimated from where the line sits in the episode.

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