1. Pharmacotherapy Decision Support System to Help Improve the Effectiveness of Diabetes Treatment in the USA
In the USA, where one in four people aged 65 and over are diabetic*, the expense of long-term drug treatments is a major issue for patients. In response, Hitachi and the University of Utah have jointly developed a pharmacotherapy decision support system that helps patients and clinicians considering treatment strategies to reach a common understanding.
The system uses its special technology for building state transition models of past medication patterns contained in clinical data on 27,904 diabetes cases held by the university. This can be used to predict the therapeutic efficacy of particular drugs (for example, the probability of achieving a blood sugar control goal after three months) based on the patient’s condition. The technology provides more accurate probability calculations than conventional machine learning (an 80% reduction in error), with a comparison display presenting both the drug cost and risk of side effects on an electronic health record system. As a result, use of the system enables both therapeutic efficacy and expense to be taken into account when deciding on a treatment strategy. Clinical trials at 13 clinics affiliated with the University of Utah commenced in February 2019 in preparation for practical deployment. Further improvements are also being made to the system while increasing the number of cases using the application. Hitachi will continue to use this system to contribute to the realization of healthcare services that aim to improve the quality of life (QoL) of patients.
[01]Dashboard of pharmacotherapy decision support system
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- Source: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “National Diabetes Statistics Report,” 2020