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About BowelScreen

BowelScreen is Ireland’s national bowel cancer screening programme, operating under the HSE’s National Screening Service. It offers free screening to eligible individuals aged 59 to 69, with the goal of detecting colorectal cancer early and improving patient outcomes through timely intervention.

The Requirement

The Microb-AI-ome project, funded by Horizon Europe, brings together institutions from five countries to investigate whether AI-driven analysis of gut microbiome data can improve the accuracy of bowel cancer screening. The research aims to reduce unnecessary colonoscopies, enhance early detection, and improve patient outcomes in the future.

Professor Pádraic Mac Mathúna MD FRCPI, Clinical Director, BowelScreen Ireland said:

“This research could pave the way for a more accurate and efficient screening process that supports early detection and prevention of bowel cancer and reduces unnecessary colonoscopies, ultimately improving outcomes for screening participants across Europe.”

To support this effort, BowelScreen needed a secure, scalable, and compliant cloud-based platform to manage anonymised data from Irish screening participants. The solution had to meet the highest standards of data protection, integrate with European research infrastructure, and enable real-time analysis of millions of data points per patient. The team knew they needed a trusted technology partner with extensive cloud and data protection knowledge to assist them on this project. They reached out to Viatel and began exploring their options.

The Solution

For the AI to function effectively, it requires access to a broad and diverse dataset from volunteer screening participants. To ensure privacy and compliance, the Microb-AI-ome platform anonymises all sensitive information and retains it within secure cloud databases. To contribute to this international research effort, BowelScreen has facilitated the enrolment of patients by three research hospitals across Ireland, who will provide stool samples for mirco biome analysis. Viatel, leveraging Microsoft Azure technology,  developed the bespoke, cloud-based data-management solution to manage the Irish data repository.

Security and compliance were central to the platform’s development. Fully aligned with Irish legislation and GDPR, the system ensures patient confidentiality while enabling advanced AI analysis.

“The platform we have devised with Viatel will allow us to analyse a huge volume of metadata generated from participants’ stool samples to make it interpretable as a signal to say the person is at risk, or is not at risk. Viatel has the experience and expertise to develop what we need. It was really beneficial to have that collaboration between Microsoft and Viatel to be able to generate this platform for us,”

Professor Pádraic Mac Mathúna said.

The Outcome

The result is a transformative step forward in population-based cancer screening. The platform enables real-time analysis of millions of data points per patient, helping to detect pre-cancer changes and reduce unnecessary procedures.

James Finglas, Managing Director of Viatel Digital Services, echoed the impact:

 “This is game-changing for the potential use of AI in population-based cancer screening. It analyses millions of data points per patient to identify an individual’s risk of pre-cancer changes or bowel cancer. Consequently, this technology may identify those who need a colonoscopy, creating positive outcomes for patients”.

To learn more about Viatel or to speak to a member of our team, get in touch today by emailing hello@viatel.com.