MD-MTL: An Ensemble Med-Multi-Task Learning Package for DiseaseScores Prediction and Multi-Level Risk Factor Analysis

Abstract: While many machine learning methods have been used for medical prediction and risk factor analysis on healthcare data, most prior research has involved single-task learning (STL) methods. However, healthcare research often involves multiple related tasks. For instance, implementation of disease scores prediction and risk factor analysis in multiple subgroups of patients simultaneously and risk factor analysis at multi-levels synchronously. In this paper, we developed a new ensemble machine learning Python package based on multi-task learning (MTL), referred to as the Med-Multi-Task Learning (MD-MTL) package and applied it in predicting disease scores of patients, and in carrying out risk factor analysis on multiple subgroups of patients simultaneously. Our experimental results on two datasets demonstrate the utility of the MD-MTL package, and show the advantage of MTL (vs. STL), when analyzing data that is organized into different categories (tasks, which can be various age groups, different levels of disease severity, etc.).