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1. Predicting Criticality in COVID-19 Patients

   https://doi.org/10.1145/3388440.3412463  

   Hallman, Roger A.; Chikkula, Anjali; Prioleau, Temiloluwa (September 2020, ACM International Conference on Bioinformatics, Computational Biology and Health Informatics (BCB))

   The COVID-19 pandemic has infected millions of people around the world, spreading rapidly and causing a flood of patients that risk overwhelming clinical facilities. Whether in urban or rural areas, hospitals have limited resources and personnel to treat critical infections in intensive care units, which must be allocated effectively. To assist clinical staff in deciding which patients are in the greatest need of critical care, we develop a predictive model based on a publicly-available data set that is rich in clinical markers. We perform statistical analysis to determine which clinical markers strongly correlate with hospital admission, semi-intensive care, and intensive care for COVID-19 patients. We create a predictive model that will assist clinical personnel in determining COVID-19 patient prognosis. Additionally, we take a step towards a global framework for COVID-19 prognosis prediction by incorporating statistical data for geographically and ethnically diverse COVID--19 patient sets into our own model. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first model which does not exclusively utilize local data. 

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2. Deep Multi-Modal Transfer Learning for Augmented Patient Acuity Assessment in the Intelligent ICU

   https://doi.org/10.3389/fdgth.2021.640685  

   Shickel, Benjamin; Davoudi, Anis; Ozrazgat-Baslanti, Tezcan; Ruppert, Matthew; Bihorac, Azra; Rashidi, Parisa (February 2021, Frontiers in Digital Health)

   Accurate prediction and monitoring of patient health in the intensive care unit can inform shared decisions regarding appropriateness of care delivery, risk-reduction strategies, and intensive care resource use. Traditionally, algorithmic solutions for patient outcome prediction rely solely on data available from electronic health records (EHR). In this pilot study, we explore the benefits of augmenting existing EHR data with novel measurements from wrist-worn activity sensors as part of a clinical environment known as the Intelligent ICU. We implemented temporal deep learning models based on two distinct sources of patient data: (1) routinely measured vital signs from electronic health records, and (2) activity data collected from wearable sensors. As a proxy for illness severity, our models predicted whether patients leaving the intensive care unit would be successfully or unsuccessfully discharged from the hospital. We overcome the challenge of small sample size in our prospective cohort by applying deep transfer learning using EHR data from a much larger cohort of traditional ICU patients. Our experiments quantify added utility of non-traditional measurements for predicting patient health, especially when applying a transfer learning procedure to small novel Intelligent ICU cohorts of critically ill patients. 

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3. A Mobile App That Addresses Interpretability Challenges in Machine Learning–Based Diabetes Predictions: Survey-Based User Study

   https://doi.org/10.2196/50328  

   Hendawi, Rasha; Li, Juan; Roy, Souradip (January 2023, JMIR Formative Research)

   BackgroundMachine learning approaches, including deep learning, have demonstrated remarkable effectiveness in the diagnosis and prediction of diabetes. However, these approaches often operate as opaque black boxes, leaving health care providers in the dark about the reasoning behind predictions. This opacity poses a barrier to the widespread adoption of machine learning in diabetes and health care, leading to confusion and eroding trust. ObjectiveThis study aimed to address this critical issue by developing and evaluating an explainable artificial intelligence (AI) platform, XAI4Diabetes, designed to empower health care professionals with a clear understanding of AI-generated predictions and recommendations for diabetes care. XAI4Diabetes not only delivers diabetes risk predictions but also furnishes easily interpretable explanations for complex machine learning models and their outcomes. MethodsXAI4Diabetes features a versatile multimodule explanation framework that leverages machine learning, knowledge graphs, and ontologies. The platform comprises the following four essential modules: (1) knowledge base, (2) knowledge matching, (3) prediction, and (4) interpretation. By harnessing AI techniques, XAI4Diabetes forecasts diabetes risk and provides valuable insights into the prediction process and outcomes. A structured, survey-based user study assessed the app’s usability and influence on participants’ comprehension of machine learning predictions in real-world patient scenarios. ResultsA prototype mobile app was meticulously developed and subjected to thorough usability studies and satisfaction surveys. The evaluation study findings underscore the substantial improvement in medical professionals’ comprehension of key aspects, including the (1) diabetes prediction process, (2) data sets used for model training, (3) data features used, and (4) relative significance of different features in prediction outcomes. Most participants reported heightened understanding of and trust in AI predictions following their use of XAI4Diabetes. The satisfaction survey results further revealed a high level of overall user satisfaction with the tool. ConclusionsThis study introduces XAI4Diabetes, a versatile multi-model explainable prediction platform tailored to diabetes care. By enabling transparent diabetes risk predictions and delivering interpretable insights, XAI4Diabetes empowers health care professionals to comprehend the AI-driven decision-making process, thereby fostering transparency and trust. These advancements hold the potential to mitigate biases and facilitate the broader integration of AI in diabetes care. 

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4. Applications of Federated Learning in Mobile Health: Scoping Review

   https://doi.org/10.2196/43006  

   Wang, Tongnian; Du, Yan; Gong, Yanmin; Choo, Kim-Kwang Raymond; Guo, Yuanxiong (January 2023, Journal of Medical Internet Research)

   Background The proliferation of mobile health (mHealth) applications is partly driven by the advancements in sensing and communication technologies, as well as the integration of artificial intelligence techniques. Data collected from mHealth applications, for example, on sensor devices carried by patients, can be mined and analyzed using artificial intelligence–based solutions to facilitate remote and (near) real-time decision-making in health care settings. However, such data often sit in data silos, and patients are often concerned about the privacy implications of sharing their raw data. Federated learning (FL) is a potential solution, as it allows multiple data owners to collaboratively train a machine learning model without requiring access to each other’s raw data. Objective The goal of this scoping review is to gain an understanding of FL and its potential in dealing with sensitive and heterogeneous data in mHealth applications. Through this review, various stakeholders, such as health care providers, practitioners, and policy makers, can gain insight into the limitations and challenges associated with using FL in mHealth and make informed decisions when considering implementing FL-based solutions. Methods We conducted a scoping review following the guidelines of PRISMA-ScR (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses Extension for Scoping Reviews). We searched 7 commonly used databases. The included studies were analyzed and summarized to identify the possible real-world applications and associated challenges of using FL in mHealth settings. Results A total of 1095 articles were retrieved during the database search, and 26 articles that met the inclusion criteria were included in the review. The analysis of these articles revealed 2 main application areas for FL in mHealth, that is, remote monitoring and diagnostic and treatment support. More specifically, FL was found to be commonly used for monitoring self-care ability, health status, and disease progression, as well as in diagnosis and treatment support of diseases. The review also identified several challenges (eg, expensive communication, statistical heterogeneity, and system heterogeneity) and potential solutions (eg, compression schemes, model personalization, and active sampling). Conclusions This scoping review has highlighted the potential of FL as a privacy-preserving approach in mHealth applications and identified the technical limitations associated with its use. The challenges and opportunities outlined in this review can inform the research agenda for future studies in this field, to overcome these limitations and further advance the use of FL in mHealth. 

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5. Improving Risk Prediction of Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus Using Machine Learning Methods With Network Features: Retrospective Development Study

   https://doi.org/10.2196/48067  

   Kamruzzaman, Methun; Heavey, Jack; Song, Alexander; Bielskas, Matthew; Bhattacharya, Parantapa; Madden, Gregory; Klein, Eili; Deng, Xinwei; Vullikanti, Anil (January 2024, JMIR AI)

   Health care–associated infections due to multidrug-resistant organisms (MDROs), such as methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and Clostridioides difficile (CDI), place a significant burden on our health care infrastructure. Screening for MDROs is an important mechanism for preventing spread but is resource intensive. The objective of this study was to develop automated tools that can predict colonization or infection risk using electronic health record (EHR) data, provide useful information to aid infection control, and guide empiric antibiotic coverage. We retrospectively developed a machine learning model to detect MRSA colonization and infection in undifferentiated patients at the time of sample collection from hospitalized patients at the University of Virginia Hospital. We used clinical and nonclinical features derived from on-admission and throughout-stay information from the patient’s EHR data to build the model. In addition, we used a class of features derived from contact networks in EHR data; these network features can capture patients’ contacts with providers and other patients, improving model interpretability and accuracy for predicting the outcome of surveillance tests for MRSA. Finally, we explored heterogeneous models for different patient subpopulations, for example, those admitted to an intensive care unit or emergency department or those with specific testing histories, which perform better. We found that the penalized logistic regression performs better than other methods, and this model’s performance measured in terms of its receiver operating characteristics-area under the curve score improves by nearly 11% when we use polynomial (second-degree) transformation of the features. Some significant features in predicting MDRO risk include antibiotic use, surgery, use of devices, dialysis, patient’s comorbidity conditions, and network features. Among these, network features add the most value and improve the model’s performance by at least 15%. The penalized logistic regression model with the same transformation of features also performs better than other models for specific patient subpopulations. Our study shows that MRSA risk prediction can be conducted quite effectively by machine learning methods using clinical and nonclinical features derived from EHR data. Network features are the most predictive and provide significant improvement over prior methods. Furthermore, heterogeneous prediction models for different patient subpopulations enhance the model’s performance. 

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