Question

Help me answer the following questions

1. Clinical Decision Support Systems

• What is it used for?
• How does it work and where does the data come from (sources)?
• What are its benefits?
• What are its drawbacks?

Answer 1

The Clinical decision support systems are used to assist the care providers in diagnosing a particular health condition, and other clinical decision making situations.

The two main types of CDSS are,

1. Knowledge-based CDSS: It uses an inference engine and apply the stipulated rules to the collected patient information, and present the results. Most of these systems include a data repository, an inference mechanism, and a communication mechanism. It works based on “if-then” principle.
2. Non-knowledge based CDSS: It includes an interference machine that learns analyzing the clinical information fed into it. For example, an artificial neural network learns to work without pre-programming it does not apply the if-then rules or the other specific rules. Instead, it considers the patient data and interpret the association between the clinical diagnosis and symptoms presented.

The benefits of CDDS:

Combined with electronic health records (EHR), the CDDS can effectively address the issues regarding the adverse drug reactions, medication errors (prescription errors and others). It can also consider the past medical history of the patient in the interpretation of the current medical condition.

The drawbacks of CDDS:

The errors in data input can result in potentially significant errors in the interpretation and treatment plan. All the data is to be entered into the system, and it requires a trained individual. Information confidentiality is a concern when the HER and CDDS are to be combined.