Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2023 Aug 29:9:20552076231194551.
doi: 10.1177/20552076231194551. eCollection 2023 Jan-Dec.

Digital pathology world tour

Paola Chiara Rizzo  1 , Alessandro Caputo  2 , Eddy Maddalena  3 , Nicolò Caldonazzi  1 , Ilaria Girolami  4   5 , Angelo Paolo Dei Tos  6 , Aldo Scarpa  1 , Marta Sbaraglia  6 , Matteo Brunelli  1 , Stefano Gobbo  7 , Stefano Marletta  8   9 , Liron Pantanowitz  10 , Vincenzo Della Mea  3 , Albino Eccher  11
Affiliations
Review

Digital pathology world tour

Paola Chiara Rizzo et al. Digit Health. .

Abstract

Objective: Digital pathology (DP) is currently in the spotlight and is rapidly gaining ground, even though the history of this field spans decades. Despite great technological progress, the adoption of DP for routine clinical diagnostic use remains limited.

Methods: A systematic search was conducted in the electronic databases Pubmed-MEDLINE and Embase. Inclusion criteria were all published studies that encompassed any application of DP.

Results: Of 4888 articles retrieved, 4041 were included. Relevant articles were categorized as "diagnostic" (147/4041, 4%) where DP was utilized for routine diagnostic workflow and "non-diagnostic" (3894/4041, 96%) for all other applications. The "non-diagnostic" articles were further categorized according to DP application including "artificial intelligence" (33%), "education" (5%), "narrative" (17%) for reviews and editorials, and "technical" (45%) for pure research publications.

Conclusion: This manuscript provided temporal and geographical insight into the global adoption of DP by analyzing the published scientific literature.

Keywords: Artificial intelligence; digital pathology; image analysis; systematic review; whole slide imaging.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Albino Eccher is currently affiliated with Section of Pathology, Department of Medical and Surgical Sciences for Children and Adults, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, University Hospital of Modena, Modena, Italy. The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Number of publications worldwide.
Figure 2.
Figure 2.
Number of publications in Europe.
Figure 3.
Figure 3.
Number of publications for each label.
Figure 4.
Figure 4.
Overview of papers of the diagnostic category.
Figure 5.
Figure 5.
Number of publications per decade.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Della Mea V. 25 Years of telepathology research: a bibliometric analysis. Diagn Pathol 2011; 6: S26. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Pantanowitz L, Sinard JH, Henricks WH, et al. Validating whole slide imaging for diagnostic purposes in pathology: guideline from the College of American Pathologists Pathology and Laboratory Quality Center. Arch Pathol Lab Med 2013; 137: 1710–1722. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Evans AJ, Brown RW, Bui MM, et al. Validating whole slide imaging systems for diagnostic purposes in pathology. Arch Pathol Lab Med 2022; 146: 440–450. - PubMed
    1. Fraggetta F, L’Imperio V, Ameisen D, et al. Best practice recommendations for the implementation of a digital pathology workflow in the anatomic pathology laboratory by the European Society of Digital and Integrative Pathology (ESDIP). Diagnostics 2021; 11: 2167. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Page MJ, McKenzie JE, Bossuyt PM, et al. The PRISMA 2020 statement: an updated guideline for reporting systematic reviews. Br Med J 2021; n71(372). doi:10.1136/bmj.n71 - DOI - PMC - PubMed

LinkOut - more resources