Decision Support Systems for Guideline and Knowledge Navigation Over Different Levels of Abstraction of the Guidelines

• US 20080097965A1
• Filed: 09/22/2005
• Published: 04/24/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 09/30/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Koninklijke Philips Electronics N.V. (Koninklijke Philips N.V.)
• Original Assignee: Koninklijke Philips Electronics N.V. (Koninklijke Philips N.V.)
• Inventors: Alsafadi, Yasser
• Granted Patent: US 8,448,077 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 50/20 for computer-aided diagnosis, e.g. based on medical expert systems
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 70/20 relating to practices or guidelines

Abstract

A system and method are provided for executing an executable clinical practice guideline for providing guidance in treating a patient. The system includes a guideline repository providing for storing a plurality of executable clinical practice guidelines, at least one interface providing for entry of clinical context data associated with at least one of the patient and the patient'"'"'s treatment and a display. A system server, which upon receipt of said clinical context data, automatically chooses an appropriate clinical practice guideline and displays the guideline with a visual navigator on the display. The server automatically provides the guideline at its present level of abstraction, and also provides the user with a visual navigator which defines the current level of abstraction; Alternatively, upon receipt of a signal generated by a user to manually choose, via the UI, the guideline and the level of abstraction of the guideline, which are then displayed. The level of abstraction may be changed by user input in both manual and automatic mode.

Claims

1. A computing system for executing an executable practice or professional guideline or knowledge base to receive guidance and/or knowledge contained in the guideline at a proper level of abstraction to meet a context definition appropriate for the slated use of the practice information or knowledge, the computing system comprising:

a guideline repository for storage and retrieval of a plurality of executable technical practice guidelines;

at least one interface providing for entry of one of context data and a control signal defining context of the information/guidance needs;

a display,

a system server, which upon receipt of said context data, automatically chooses an appropriate technical practice guideline and displays the guideline with a visual navigator on the display, and which upon receipt of a user input choosing/changing the guideline results in a new guideline displayed at a particular level of abstraction, and wherein the level of abstraction may be changed by user input in both manual and automatic mode.

2. The computing system of claim 1, wherein the practice guideline is a clinical practice guideline/knowledge base in the medical field.

3. The computing system as set forth in claim 2, further comprising at least one data source to provide at least a portion of the patient data;

and wherein execution of the at least the associated clinical guideline includes providing for retrieving selected data from the at least one data source.

4. The computing system of claim 2, further comprising an event notification server, wherein:

the decision support system provides for determining if the selected data to be retrieved from the at least one data source are available;

the event notification server provides for notifying the decision support system upon the availability of new data via the at least one data source, and

when the new data are usable for the selected data that was determined to be not available, the decision support system provides for processing the new data including providing for using the new data for providing the selected data that was not available for use in execution of the at least one associated guideline.

5. A method for automatically or manually accessing a proper technical practice guideline for a determined context, as well as the proper level of abstraction of the guideline based on same context, including the steps of:

selecting and displaying a practice guideline in response to receipt of data defining the context of the technical problem;

selecting a level of abstraction with the guideline based on same context, where the level of abstraction in the guideline is displayed for user review;

responding the user input through the UI, which changes the level of abstraction of the current guideline.

6. The method as set forth in claim 5, wherein the step of displaying and selecting the guideline is performed automatically in accordance the context.

7. The method as set forth in claim 6, wherein the step of displaying and selecting are determined automatically by receipt of a guideline control signal, predefined in accordance with context.

8. The method as set forth in claim 5, wherein the step of selecting and displaying the guideline is performed in response to user input.

9. The method as set forth in claim 5, wherein the guideline and knowledge base are medical related clinical practice guidelines/knowledge.

10. The method as set forth in claim 9, wherein the context is defined by patient data and/or value.

11. The method according to claim 5, wherein the step of responding includes providing for retrieving selected data from at least one data source.

12. A computer data signal embodied in a transmission medium for execution by at least one processor which provides a user interface for accessing a practice guideline from a plurality of practice guidelines, and navigating a level of abstraction within the guideline in accordance with a context of the technical application, the data signal comprising:

a code segment for selecting and displaying a practice guideline in response to receipt of data defining the context of the task at hand,

a code segment which responds to the user'"'"'s manual selection of a guideline via a user interface (UI), where the guideline is displayed for user review;

a code segment which responds to a user'"'"'s input, via an interface, that changes the level of abstraction of the current guideline.

13. The computer data signal as set forth in claim 12, wherein the data defining the contest of the task at hand is medical, the context concerns some value attributable to a medical patient, and the guidelines are clinical practice guidelines.

14. The computer data signal as set forth in claim, wherein the context is provided automatically to the code segment for selecting and displaying.