Method for the construction and utilization of a medical records system

• US 20080319800A1
• Filed: 07/08/2008
• Published: 12/25/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 03/10/1999
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Anthony J. Schaeffer, Ophir Frieder
• Original Assignee: Anthony J. Schaeffer, Ophir Frieder
• Inventors: Frieder, Ophir, Schaeffer, Anthony J.
• Granted Patent: US 7,627,489 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/3
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 10/20 for electronic clinical trials or questionnaires
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 50/20 for computer-aided diagnosis, e.g. based on medical expert systems
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 50/70 for mining of medical data, e.g. analysing previous cases of other patients
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 70/60 relating to pathologies

Abstract

A method for the construction and utilization of a medical records system capable of providing a continuous data stream of epidemiological data to the records system via kits provided to the symptomatic population to obtain and record an epidemiological profile in a searchable database by applying data mining or automated intelligence techniques whereby, when a valid epidemiological profile is established in the database, automated diagnosis and prescription of treatment may be had for patients presenting similar symptoms. Knowledge discovery techniques may further operate on the database to provide suggested courses of treatment for a virtual class of patients, epidemic threat awareness, and knowledge of drug resistance mutations by a pathogen without direct query of the database.

Claims

1. A method for the construction and utilization of a medical records system, comprising:

collecting prior epidemiological information of persons previously having symptoms of a disease, the prior epidemiological information including a record of a plurality of different types of pathogens known for causing the disease, antimicrobials used for treating the disease, and treatment efficacy of the antimicrobials;

entering and storing the collected prior epidemiological information in an electronic database;

creating an automated knowledge discovery system including organizing the prior epidemiological information in the electronic database to make the prior epidemiological information amenable to data mining;

receiving patient epidemiological information of a patient into a query function of the database;

automatically predicting a pathogen causing a disease of the patient from the plurality of different types of pathogens known for causing the disease by data mining the organized epidemiological information as a function of similarities of the patient epidemiological information with the organized epidemiological information and without first performing a diagnostic test on a sample from the patient; and

prescribing a course of treatment to the patient based on the prediction of the data mining.

2. The method according to claim 1, wherein prescribing the course of treatment to the patient comprises automatically issuing to a medical practitioner treating the patient a report including an antimicrobial treatment for the patient based on the predicted pathogen.

3. The method according to claim 1, further including allowing the persons previously having symptoms of a disease to test for pathogen identification.

4. The method according to claim 1, further including allowing the patient to test for treatment efficacy and entering results of the efficacy test into the database.

5. The method according to claim 1, wherein said course of treatment includes an antimicrobial prescribed to the patient.

6. The method according to claim 1, wherein said course of treatment includes enumeration of antimicrobials not to be prescribed to the patient.

7. The method according to claim 1, wherein said data mining further includes:

identifying information common to the persons who developed an infection from a particular pathogen.

8. The method according to claim 1, wherein said data mining further includes:

identifying the efficacy of antimicrobials used in treating the predicted pathogen.

9. The method according to claim 1, said knowledge discovery system further providing predictive treatment outcome generation via a virtual patient to develop answers to hypothetical scenarios by automatically mining the data to derive potential treatment patterns for a virtual patient or group of patients as one type of the given suggestions.

10. The method according to claim 1, the knowledge discovery system further providing epidemic threat detection through data mining related to group diagnostic patterns and demographic categories as one type of the given suggestions.

11. The method according to claim 1, wherein creating the knowledge discovery system comprises data transformation of the entered prior epidemiological information to a common format.

12. The method according to claim 1, wherein creating the knowledge discovery system includes data mining of the prior epidemiological information to detect patterns found in the prior epidemiological information.

13. The method according to claim 1, wherein creating the knowledge discovery system includes a process comprising iterative refinement of the following steps:

data cleaning of the entered epidemiological information;

data transformation of the entered epidemiological information to a common format;

data mining of the entered epidemiological information; and

pattern evaluation and knowledge representation of knowledge gained from the data mining.

14. The method according to claim 1, further comprising providing a kit to each of a plurality of members of a population presenting symptoms associated with the disease, the kit including means for collecting the prior epidemiological information.

15. The method according to claim 1, further comprising distributing a plurality of first kits to a population presenting symptoms of the disease, wherein the first kits are for establishing and recording the prior epidemiological information;

and

distributing a second kit to an undiagnosed patient presenting symptoms of the disease for establishing the patient epidemiological information.

16. A method for the utilization of a medical records system, comprising:

maintaining a searchable electronic database storing prior epidemiological information of persons previously having symptoms of diseases, wherein the prior epidemiological information is organized to make the prior epidemiological information amenable to data mining, the database including a record of a plurality of different types of pathogens known for causing the diseases, antimicrobials used for treating the diseases, and treatment efficacy of the antimicrobials;

receiving through a query function of the database patient epidemiological information of a patient, the patient epidemiological information including at least one symptom of the patient and demographic and personal information for the patient;

automatically predicting a pathogen of the patient from the record of the plurality of different types of pathogens by data mining the organized epidemiological information as a function of similarities of the patient epidemiological information with the organized epidemiological information and without first performing a diagnostic test on a sample from the patient;

automatically prescribing a course of treatment to the patient based on the prediction of the data mining.

17. The method according to claim 16, wherein prescribing a course of treatment to the patient comprises automatically issuing to a medical practitioner treating the patient a report including an antimicrobial treatment for the patient based on the predicted pathogen.

18. The method according to claim 17, further comprising receiving the patient epidemiological information from a medical practitioner treating the patient and automatically submitting to the medical practitioner the pathogen prediction for prescribing antimicrobial treatment to the patient based on the prediction.

19. The method according to claim 17, wherein the prior epidemiological information includes personal information, demographic information, symptoms, samples, or combinations thereof.

20. A method for the utilization of a medical records system, comprising:

maintaining a searchable electronic database storing prior epidemiological information of persons previously having symptoms of diseases, wherein the prior epidemiological information is organized to make the prior epidemiological information amenable to data mining, the database including a record of a plurality of different types of pathogens known for causing the diseases, antimicrobials used for treating the diseases, and treatment efficacy of the antimicrobials;

receiving from a medical practitioner through a query function of the database patient epidemiological information of a patient, the patient epidemiological information including at least one symptom of the patient and demographic and personal information for the patient;

automatically predicting with a data processor in communication with the database a pathogen of the patient from the record of the plurality of different types of pathogens by data mining the organized epidemiological information as a function of similarities of the patient epidemiological information with the organized epidemiological information and without first performing a diagnostic test on a sample from the patient;

the data processor automatically issuing to the medical practitioner a report including at least one of the predicted pathogen or an antimicrobial treatment for the patient based on the predicted pathogen.