CarePre: An Intelligent Clinical Decision Assistance System

Abstract: Clinical decision support systems (CDSS) are widely used to assist with medical decision making. However, CDSS typically require manually curated rules and other data which are difficult to maintain and keep up-to-date. Recent systems leverage advanced deep learning techniques and electronic health records (EHR) to provide more timely and precise results. Many of these techniques have been developed with a common focus on predicting upcoming medical events. However, while the prediction results from these approaches are promising, their value is limited by their lack of interpretability. To address this challenge, we introduce CarePre, an intelligent clinical decision assistance system. The system extends a state-of-the-art deep learning model to predict upcoming diagnosis events for a focal patient based on his/her historical medical records. The system includes an interactive framework together with intuitive visualizations designed to support the diagnosis, treatment outcome analysis, and the interpretation of the analysis results. We demonstrate the effectiveness and usefulness of CarePre system by reporting results from a quantities evaluation of the prediction algorithm and a case study and three interviews with senior physicians.