A DeepSeek-Powered AI System for Automated Chest Radiograph Interpretation in Clinical Practice

TL;DR

This paper introduces Janus-Pro-CXR, an AI system powered by DeepSeek for automated chest X-ray interpretation, validated through a multicenter trial, outperforming existing models in report accuracy and clinical workflow efficiency.

Contribution

The study presents a novel DeepSeek-based AI system that achieves superior report generation and clinical validation, with open-source architecture to enhance radiology workflows.

Findings

Outperforms state-of-the-art report generation models

Reduces interpretation time by 18.3% in clinical settings

Preferred by experts in over half of cases

Abstract

A global shortage of radiologists has been exacerbated by the significant volume of chest X-ray workloads, particularly in primary care. Although multimodal large language models show promise, existing evaluations predominantly rely on automated metrics or retrospective analyses, lacking rigorous prospective clinical validation. Janus-Pro-CXR (1B), a chest X-ray interpretation system based on DeepSeek Janus-Pro model, was developed and rigorously validated through a multicenter prospective trial (NCT07117266). Our system outperforms state-of-the-art X-ray report generation models in automated report generation, surpassing even larger-scale models including ChatGPT 4o (200B parameters), while demonstrating reliable detection of six clinically critical radiographic findings. Retrospective evaluation confirms significantly higher report accuracy than Janus-Pro and ChatGPT 4o. In prospective clinical deployment, AI assistance significantly improved report quality scores, reduced interpretation time by 18.3% (P < 0.001), and was preferred by a majority of experts in 54.3% of cases. Through lightweight architecture and domain-specific optimization, Janus-Pro-CXR improves diagnostic reliability and workflow efficiency, particularly in resource-constrained settings. The model architecture and implementation framework will be open-sourced to facilitate the clinical translation of AI-assisted radiology solutions.