For dogs with heart disease, a fraction of a centimeter can mean the difference between catching a problem early or missing it entirely. Now, researchers at Texas A&M University have shown that an AI-powered tool can help veterinarians make those crucial measurements more accurately and consistently.
The tool is called RadAnalyzer, and it measures heart size in dogs from routine chest X-rays. Developed through Texas A&M's Aggies Invent program, where students from different fields work together to solve real-world problems, RadAnalyzer grew from a class project into a technology that could change how vets monitor heart disease.
The challenge, researchers explained, is that measuring a dog's heart size on an X-ray is tricky. Two veterinarians looking at the same image might get slightly different results, making it hard to know if a dog's heart is truly getting bigger or if the difference is just how the doctor measured it.
"Most of the AI we're talking about isn't a black box," said Dr. Sonya Gordon, a professor at Texas A&M's College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences who led the study. "It's really a tool that helps people do their jobs better. It doesn't replace us—it helps us."
To test RadAnalyzer, researchers used more than 1,000 chest X-rays from dogs and found the tool's measurements matched those of highly trained specialists almost perfectly. The study was published in the journal PLOS ONE.
The technology measures two key indicators of heart enlargement: vertebral heart size (VHS) and vertebral left atrial size (VLAS). These measurements help vets track conditions like myxomatous mitral valve disease, a leaky valve problem especially common in older, small-breed dogs like Chihuahuas and Cavalier King Charles Spaniels. Many of these dogs develop heart murmurs long before they show any symptoms.
"Anything that makes the process easier for primary care veterinarians is valuable," Gordon said. "The radiographs are done, the measurements are already there, and all you have to do is review them and make sure they look correct."
This matters because there are only about 400 veterinary heart specialists in the entire United States. Primary care vets—in the clinics where most pets are seen—often have to make these measurements themselves without specialist training.
While echocardiography (using sound waves to image the heart) remains the gold standard for diagnosis, it requires expensive equipment and specialized expertise that many small clinics simply don't have. Chest X-rays are more affordable and widely available, making tools that improve their accuracy especially valuable for monitoring heart disease over time.
The next step is continuing to refine the technology so it can eventually help vets in actual clinics catch heart problems earlier and with more confidence.