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CLIN. CHEM. 35/8, 1595-1600 (1989) The Application of Expert Systems in the Clinical Laboratory Per WInkel An “expert system” consists of a knowledge base containing information of a general nature and an inference system that receives data from the user and applies the knowledge base to produce advice and explanations. An expert system stripped of its knowledge base (a tool) may be used to build new expert systems. Existing systems relevant for laboratory medicine are reviewed. The role in the laboratory of expert systems and their integration and evaluation are discussed. In this paper I will review and discuss a particular approach to computer-supported medical decision making (CMD), namely the use of the so-called expert systems. Other approaches to CM]) include the use of clinical algorithms (1,2), probabilistic reasoning [application of Bayes theorem, decision analysis (3-7)1, and biodynamic modeling (8). These latter techniques, although useful in many contexts where one needs computational power to solve well-defined problems, also have some limitations. They each assume as a starting point a limited set of well-defined hypotheses and cannot deal with more ill-structured diagnostic problems. Medical knowledge and heuristics for problem solving are never explicitly expressed. Furthermore, traditional programs lack conversational capabilities and the ability to explain the basis for their recommendations in terms that are understandable to the physician. Also, they usually must have a complete data set. For these reasons, several researchers in artificial intelligence (Al) began to apply their techniques to develop systems for computer-aided medical decision making. Actually, more than 10 years ago the topic of Al was discussed within the context of using laboratory data in the decisionmaking process (9). Al emphasizes computer applications that involve the processing of symbolic information. The types of Al computer programs intended to assist in the clinical decision-making process are often referred to as expert systems. The General Structure of an Expert System Certain generalizations may be made about the nature and structure of expert systems (see Figure 1). The key component is the knowledge base. The knowledge base consists of facts such as those that can be found in a textbook, beliefs, and heuristic knowledge. Heuristic knowledge is the knowledge of good practice and judgement, i.e., the experiential knowledge that a skilled expert acquires over the years. This information is difficult for the expert to make explicit. To help, he or she is assisted by a so-called knowledge engineer, who knows how to represent knowl- Department of Clinical Chemistry, University Hospital of Copenhagen, Blegdamsvej 9, DK-2100 Copenhagen, Denmark. Received February 6, 1989; accepted April 14, 1989. ExerI Uses Knowledge enginee’ Fig. 1. Basic structureof an expert system Three subjectsorgroupsare Involved In the constructionand useof an expert system:the expert,who enters knowledgevia knowledgeacquisition facilities intothe knowledgebase;the knowledgeengineer, who assists him and also knowshow to construct a program(the Inferencesystem) which reasons on the basis of knowledge;and the userof the system,who communicates with thesystemws theinput/outputsystem.Reproducedfrom (10), with permission edge in a computer and construct a program that reasons on the basis of knowledge. A knowledge base is different from a database. The knowledge base contains information of a general nature, whereas the database typically contains the individual patient’s records. In addition to the knowledge base, an expert system needs an inference system that receives specific facts and data from the user and reasons on the basis of this information and the knowledge base to produce advice and explanations to the user. Here I will review the basic principles of knowledge representation and design of inference systems that have been applied within the field of medical expert systems. Knowledge Representation and Inference Procedures Two different approaches to represent knowledge in expert systems have been followed. One approach is based on a representation of the knowledge in the form of rules (production rules, IF-THEN rules), which are applied in an orderly manner to produce the solution of a diagnostic problem. By the other approach, diseases and clinical, physiological, or pathophysiological states are each characterized by a stored pattern of anticipated findings to be matched with the clinical findings observed in the patient. These patterns, referred to as nodes or frames (see 11 for technical details about nodes and frames), are interconnected by links representing various relations and dependencies. Such networks of nodes and frames are excellent to represent hierarchical knowledge structures. Newer programs (second-generation programs) are em- CLINICAL CHEMISTRY, Vol. 35, No. 8, 1989 1595 ploying networks where the use of causal pathophysiological knowledge is emphasized. A typical feature of these programs is a taxonomic structuring of the nodes and links that allows diagnostic and other types of reasoning to proceed at various levels of detail. Production-Rule-Based Systems Knowledge may be represented as a collection of conditional sentences referred to as “production rules.” A production rule consists of a set of preconditions, referred to as the premise, and an action part. lithe premise is true, the conclusion in the action part is justified. A prominent example of a system based on the production rule formalism is the MYCIN system (12), which provides consultation about infectious disease, diagnosis, and choice of therapy. An example of a rule from this system is as follows: IF (1) the Gram stain of the organism is Gram negative, and (2) the morphology of the organism is rod, and (3) the aerobicity of the organism is anaerobic, THEN there is suggestive evidence (0.6) that the genus of the organism is Bacteroides. Each conclusion includes a certainty factor (CF) ranging from 1 (complete belief) via 0 (nothing known) to -1 (complete disbelief), and each assertation is associated with a CF. If the CF on a premise is positive above a certain threshold (0.2), the corresponding conclusion is drawn with a certainty that is equal to the premise’s CF times the conclusion’s own CF. Evidence confirming a hypothesis is collected separately from that which disconfirms it, and the truth of a hypothesis is the sum of the evidence for and against the same hypothesis. Other approaches for the handling of incorrect or uncertain data have been proposed (11, 13). MYCIN knows that its goal is to undertake a number of tasks such as (e.g.) to determine if there is a substantial infection in the patient. To accomplish a goal, MYCIN evaluates all rules relevant for this goal. This creates a need to evaluate the premises of these rules, and these then become new subgoals, which are treated in the same way-i.e., the rules relevant for these subgoals are evaluated. When no rules are found that apply to a subgoal, the user is asked to supply the needed information. This way of searching for a solution is referred to as “backwards chaining.” A “forward chaining” or “data driven” approach is used when the patient’s data are entered without guidance by the computer. Those rules whose premises match the data are then applied, and new rules that use the conclusions in their premise conditions are subsequently applied, etc. Instead of using one of the two strategies, it is also possible to combine them into a mixed strategy. Expert Systems with Semantic Networks and Frames In addition to production rules, semantic networks or frames may be used to represent knowledge. This knowledge representation has been used in a number of expert systems such as iNTERNIST-i (14), which is designed to handle complex cases within the domain of general internal medicine, where several disease processes may be present. The IN’rERNIS’r-i program compares the patient’s data entered initially to the frames in its knowledge base, establishes a hypothesis about the diagnosis, and pursues this hypothesis by asking questions about the patient. On the basis of the information gained it may reject the hypothesis and establish a new one, or it may suggest a diagnosis. If symptoms of sufficient importance remain unexplained after IN’raaNIST-i has made a diagnosis, it 1596 CLINICAL CHEMISTRY, Vol. 35, No. 8, 1989 proceeds to establish additional diagnoses until all important findings have been explained. In the cASNE’r/glaucoma program (15) the knowledge about glaucoma is represented as a network of pathophysiological states (detailed description of physiological dysfunction) and causal links between states. Diseases are described as possible patterns of causally related states. During a consultation, the individual states are first confirmed or denied on the basis of observations. Then the pattern of states is matched with those described for the various diseases. The disease that provides the best match and the most parsimonious interpretation is suggested as the diagnosis. One of the more sophisticated second-generation systems is the ABEL (16), a program for use in the domain of acid-base and electrolyte disorders. Its knowledge base consists of clinical states and causal relations at multiple levels of details, the most detailed level dealing explicitly with stores of electrolytes in various body compartments and their transport between compartments. The program allows the building of composite hypotheses (patient-specific models) of possible diseases. Because this is done at multiple levels of detail, the program allows the reasoning processes to be carried out at a level that corresponds to the body of data available. The various existing expert systems have been reviewed (13, 17-22). Expert System Tools An expert system may be built from scratch, with any major programming language being used. Usually, an Al language (usP or Prolog) or one of the structured languages such as Pascal or C is used. This, however, represents a major research undertaking. Fortunately, it is also possible to create an expert system without programming if an expert-system tool (or more simply, tool) is used. A tool may be defined as any piece of software intended to help design, deliver, or maintain an expert system (23). One of the first tools (EMYcmI) was developed from MYCIN (24). EMYCIN is MYCIN without its knowledge base; i.e., the inference engine and other programs are retained. When an expert system is built from EMYCIN, the knowledge base is entered in the form of production rules. Another early rule-based tool is EXPERT (25) derived from CASNET, an expert system for diagnosis and treatment of glaucoma (15). Today, several tools are available for a wide range of computers. Most are nile-based. In some of them (induction systems), examples in the form of matrices comprising attributes and corresponding outcomes are entered by the user and the rules derived from this material by the machine (11). In other systems, the rules are entered directly. A purely nile-based system has certain limitations in that the design knowledge, consisting of structural and strategic concepts, is implicitly present in the rules (26,27). This makes it difficult to design and understand the sequence of events that takes place during inference. Some of the newer rule-based systems, such as NEOMYCIN, have been augmented to solve this problem (28). Tools designed for other types of knowledge bases, such as networks of frames, are also available, but they are less common. There are extensive catalogs of tools (29, 30). Design Considerations A stand-alone expert system is one that runs by itself and fully occupies its host computer. Most current expert sys- tems are such. However, it may not be meaningful to introduce an expert system into the laboratory or elsewhere unless it is integrated with the Laboratory (or Hospital) Information System at some level. It is needlessly cumbersome to use manual procedures to enter data into the expert system if these data already are present on disk in the Laboratory Information System (US), but it may not be easy to integrate an expert system with an information system. Kwa et al. (31) integrated a relatively simple rule-based expert system with an information system. They felt a need to define a special command language, consisting of commands for both the expert system and the information system. A rather elegant integrated system was developed by Groth and Hakman (32, 33). They connected a prototype menu-driven PC intelligent workstation with an LIS based on the MIMER database management system (34). In addition to allowing the clinician to display data graphically and to perform statisticalas well as model-based time series analysis, the workstation also allows the clinician to access an expert system, using knowledge bases worked out in collaboration between the clinic and the laboratory. A renowned information system for health care that integrates decision-making systems with a common database is the HELP system (35). The core of the HELP system is an on-line clinical database. This database is complemented by a computerized medicaldecision support system comprising a set of modular decision criteria and a program for processing this logic. The introduction of international data-transfer standards (36) would help define minimum requirements that vendors of expert system tools must meet to facilitate integration. If this were done, one might require that the following demands be at least met by a tool: (a) it should be able to read pertinent data dumped by the US on a disk in a standardized format, and (b) it should be able to dump its conclusions on a disk by using the same standardized format. Classification of Expert Systems According to Domain and Type of Probiems Solved within the Domain Table 1 lists some examples of expert systems emphasizing the use of laboratory data. The majority of systems are diagnostic systems that output a diagnosis and, possibly, suggestions for treatment. In addition to diagnoses, some systems such as the ABEL (16) make predictions, e.g., about possible effects of different therapeutic interventions. Of particular relevance for the clinical pathologist is the planning involved in the patient workup, because this has a bearing on the efficient utilization of the laboratory services. PHEO-ArFENDING is an expert system that assists the physician in this planning (42). It is designed to critique a physician’s workup of a patient with suspected pheochromocytoma. In contrast to more traditional systems, this system first asks the physician to describe his (or her) patient and to outline the approach planned. The system then critiques that plan to help the physician make the workup as rational and efficient as possible. A recommended sequence of work-up is built into the system’s knowledge base, which is organized as expressive frames associated with each test or procedure. Each frame contains a list of comments that may be output in discussing the use of the test or procedure. Each comment has an associated condition that indicates when it is to be output as part of the critique. For instance, if a CT scan is ordered without prior screening tests, a comment in the CT scan frame Table 1. Some Expert Systems Emphasizing the Use of Laboratory Data Reference System reference ABEL DomaIn Acid-base electrolytes Use Diagnosis, 16 prediction ANEMIA Anemia Diagnosis Consult-I Anemia Diagnosis RED Diagnosis histopathology Leukemia Diagnosis Erythrocyte Diagnosis PHEO- Pheochromo- 37 38 39 PAThFINDER Lymph-node EMYCIN no. 40 41 antibodies Critiqueof patient AUENDING work-up cytoma EXPERT Serum proteins Diagnosis 43 44 Diagnosis EXPERT Lipoprotein metabolism x-ray anal. of renal stones Outpatient LIVER SMR testing 100 dIseases Multiple test requests Diagnosis Diagnosis, PRO.M.O. LIThOS 42 Diagnosis (of stone content) 45 Diagnosis, 46 planning 47 48 interpretive comments suggests that these should be ordered first and that a CT scan is not indicated. The various comments generated by activating the various frames during a consultation are combined into a smooth narrative text, which is then output as a final critique. Van Lente et al. (46) used the EXPERT system (25) for sequential laboratory testing and interpretation in an outpatient setting. Abnormalities in the initial test proffle initiate a sequential laboratory testing of the specimen already collected. The incremental charge to a patient evaluated by this sequential testing program was only slightly more than the phlebotomy charge that would be incurred if one additional specimen were required for the physician to investigate an abnormality independently. Some expert systems have been limited to instruments. Weiss and Kulikowski used the EXPERT building tool (25) to construct a system that interprets serum electrophoresis patterns (43). This was later incorporated in a densitometer. Wulkan and Leijnse (45) reported a system in which a PC connected to an x-ray diffraction analyzer system preprocesses the difiIaction data on-line and stores selected data in a LISP format. These data are subsequently interpreted by a rule-based expert system umos, which reports the components and relative content of renal stones. The system was developed because of a shortage of the specialists needed to interpret diffractograms. Evaluation of Expert Systems and Expert-System Tools The evaluation problems related to expert systems are many and difficult, and much research is needed before they can be resolved. In discussing the issue of evaluation, it is important to make a clear distinction between the evaluation of the tool selected for a particular problem and the evaluation of the expert system it has been used to build (23). Miller (49) recently discussed the problems related to the evaluation of an expert system. He distinguished three CLINICAL CHEMISTRY, Vol. 35, No. 8, 1989 1597 different levels of evaluation of expert systems: (a) the subjective evaluation of the research contribution of a development prototype (i.e., does it provide new problems, solutions of problems, tools, or perhaps illustrative mistakes?); (b) the validation of a system’s knowledge and performance; and (c) the evaluation of the clinical efficacy of an operational system. The validation of a system’s knowledge includes an assessment of the accuracy, completeness, and consistency of the knowledge and the performance of the system-i.e., does it mirror the expert’s performance? A critical aspect related to the system’s performance is its ability to know its own limitation. That is, if a system is presented with an unfamiliar case, it should fail to make a diagnosis. Some of the diagnostic systems that have been tested in comparison with various experts have actually performed quite remarkably (14,43, 50,51). For instance, when eight evaluators evaluated each others’ performance as well as that of MYCIN, none of the evaluators achieved better approval than MYCIN (70%) (50). Quaglim and Stefanelli (51) had six expert hematologists from different countries evaluate the diagnostic accuracy as well as quality of medical reasoning of their colleagues and the expert system ANEMIA (37). The evaluation was done blindly. ANEMIA’s performance was not significantly different from that of the experts. Aa1Lk’s and the experts’ diagnostic performance was rated acceptable in 87% and 90% of the 30 cases, respectively. The corresponding results for medical reasoning were 87% and 80%. An interesting approach that has been implemented in some systems is to have them assist in the process of knowledge validation by searching their own knowledge bases for inconsistencies or incompleteness or by facilitating inspection of their knowledge bases (52, 53). The evaluation of an operational system depends on the nature of the system, the domain, and the clinical role it is asked to play. Issues of interest include an assessment of the physician’s (modified?) behavior, the impact of the system on quality of patient care, the patient’s health, and the overall health-care process. The economic cost effectiveness, the user’s subjective reaction to the system, the user interface, the use of the system (does the physician find it useful and continue to use it?), and peer reviews are also important measures. Within the laboratory, the impact on the total laboratory operation should be evaluated-i.e., the impact on test-turnaround time, test workload, staffing, hardware and software purchase, and maintenance of the quality of the laboratory’s consultative role. There are relatively few evaluations of operational systems. Evaluations have mainly been done in developmental systems. The evaluation of a tool poses some difficult problems. The appropriate tool can be chosen only after the requirements imposed by the problem are understood. Expert systems, however, are appropriate in instances where the problem domain is complex. Therefore, understanding these requirements may be possible only after experimenting with several prototypes. This suggests the following strategy: For the early phases of conceptualization and prototyping, a flexible tool is chosen that allows rapid development, elicits different approaches and representations, and allows the user quickly to try alternative implementations. On the basis of what was learned during prototyping, a tool is then chosen, which may very well be a different one. In a report from the RAND Corporation, the evaluation of expert-system tools is discussed (23). Five development phases are distin1598 CLINICAL CHEMISTRY, Vol. 35, No. 8, 1989 guished: exploration, prototyping, development, delivery, and operation. The tool requirements vary somewhat with the phases. Flexibility is important during the initial phases. Extensibility and vendor support are particularly important issues during prototyping and development. Later on, the user of the tool assumes the responsibility of maintenance relative to the end-user of the target expert system. Efficiency, which includes speed of response and utilization of computational and memory resources, becomes very important when the target system is operational. The clarity-i.e., the ease of understanding and using the tool-is important during all phases. Costs include the purchase price and support costs of the tool, resources consumed (person power, machinery, supplies, computation used, elapsed time, etc), hidden costs such as costs of training and integration. For the finished system, costs and efforts are involved in maintaining the system. The overall costs anticipated when a project is started should be weighed against the expected lifetime of the system and the potential benefits of such a system. Costs are important through all phases, but they are particularly important during the transitions between phases, because here we have to decide if we should switch tools or stay with what we have-or perhaps close the project. The proper choice of tool clearly depends very much on the domain and problems to be solved and the expertise available. The target environment may impose several constraints-in particular, the need to integrate the tool with existing hardware and software. Also, the characteristics of the expected end-user (pathologist or clinician) determine user-interface and explanation requirements for the target system. In my opinion, the following requirements should at least be fulfilled by a tool during all phases, except perhaps the earliest ones: (a) The tool should link to the local LIS or HIS, a graphics program, and a suitable statistical package. (b) It should support both datadriven as well as goal-driven reasoning. (c) It should have computational capabilities. The Role of Expert Systems in the Clinical Laboratory A recent survey of 102 individuals, mainly in academic clinical laboratory settings who had expressed an interest in computers, indicated that 24% were involved in developing knowledge-based systems, with most systems being at an early stage of development (54). Thus, there is a considerable interest in these systems. However, do they have a role in the clinical laboratory and, if so, what is that role? In most cases, patjeit management requires the combined use of data from a variety of sources, including the laboratory. Therefore, as pointed out by Korpmann (55), it makes a lot of sense to establish a single database of all the patient data available, such that these data are available wherever patient care is rendered or patient-care decisions are made. Within this model the clinical pathologist is an active contributor of data to the common database and not simply an end-user of an expert system utilizing these data. As one would expect, studies (56, 57) have shown that the performance of expert systems deteriorates when they are confined to laboratory data instead of incorporating all clinical data, including the laboratory data. Although the clinical pathologist should not be an end-user of these expert systems, he/she ought to play a significant role during their development because he/she is an important contributor of expert knowledge, not the least when it comes to sensible planning of the request for laboratory services during patient workup and monitoring. It is not really meaningful to locate an expert system in the laboratory unless the data of the domain are truly confined to those data produced by the laboratory. In other words, the problems addressed by expert systems located in the laboratory should be those concerned with the preprocessing of laboratory-generated data before they are transmitted to the common patient database. The types of problems suitable for an expert system are problems that require expert knowledge if they are to be solved. Thus, the problems should be difficult ones. On the other hand, they should not be too difficult. A solution that requires between 10 min and 3 h of a clinician’s time has been suggested as a good expert-system working range (11). It is also recommended that the domain knowledge be narrow and precise and the nature of the knowledge be such that it can be represented in symbolic form. The most useful knowledge is the heuristic type gained from years of experience in practical problem solving. Many of the problems that are confined mainly to laboratory data and therefore should be solved by the clinical pathologist are either rather simple or they require a lot of computations and, ideally, the use of specific mathematical, biochemical models (8,58,59)-in my opinion at least. Thus, tools other than expert systems may be more appropriate for most of those problems that require the expertise of the clinical pathologist alone. Furthermore, routine cases do not require much expertise and the processing of a case by an expert system may consume considerable resources, so it seems important that some kind of computerized screening mechanism is combined with the use of an expert system such that only the difficult cases are handed over to the expert system (55). Potential Benefits and Pitfalls of Expert Systems and Other Computer-Assisted Systems for MedIcal Decision Making There is a need for dealing optimally with the medical knowledge explosion of the last 20 to 30 years. The inability of physicians to deal with this knowledge is evidenced by several studies (60, 61). One example is the demonstration that <5% of the laboratory test data produced are actually used (62,63). Computer-assisted decision-making (CDM) systems may be the solution to this problem. This contention is supported by the fact that some systems have actually resulted in tangible improvements in clinical performance (64). It does not necessarily follow from this that CDM systems help in reducing the gathering of unnecessary information. Thus, the CDM systems may use all the data without a true need for the information. The pros and cons of CDM systems were discussed in a recent paper by de Dombal and Hilden (65). The potential benefits of CDM systems in the laboratory are improved speed and consistency in the data interpretation. Computer-assisted analysis of data to separate the uninteresting cases from the few interesting ones, and well-arranged presentation of the latter, may improve the consultative role of the laboratory director and the teaching capability of the laboratory. Automated reduction and interpretation of a large number of data items cumulated in a given patient’s file may improve and add to the diagnostic capability in the laboratory. However, there are some pitfalls. Even though the need for the CDM systems to be able to explain and justify their suggestions is emphasized, there is still a real danger that the reasoning behind the computer’s recommendations will remain implicit and concealed from the user, the result being that the CDM systems may lend authority to shallow knowledge and prejudices. In fact, what used to be easy may become difficult if simple and straightforward issues are dealt with by complicated expert-system tools. Furthermore, unless we define reasonable protocols for evaluation of new systems, one may expect industry to flood the market with poorly conceived systems. Assuming that the medical quality and the transparency of these systems are of sufficient quality, we are still left with some very difficult problems pertaining to the transfer of the systems between technical environments (moving systems from one machine to another) and between medical environments. The fact that medical science is developing very quickly implies that the lifetime of a CDM system, before it becomes obsolete, may be quite short. This may create a temptation to retain outdated systems. Development of transparent systems that can explain their reasoning (i.e., the assumptions made by the systems become explicit) and that may be transferred between technical and medical environments and easily updated and modified by the end-user represents a real challenge. I thank Dr. B. E. Statland, for constructive and valuable criticism and for calling my attention to very useful references, and Dr. J. Hilden, for a very inspiring lecture on benefits and pitfalls of computer-assisted medical-decision making. References 1 Burke MD. Clinical problem solving and laboratory investigation: contributions to laboratory medicine. In: Stefani M, Benson ES, eds. Progr Clin Pathol 1981;8:1-24. 2. Lundberg G. Using the clinical laboratory in medical decision making. 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