Computer diagnosis of primary headaches in children

Abstract

In the area of primary headaches in children several diagnostic classes (migraine, psychogenic) and other nondefined headaches are recognized. Their clinical diagnosis is complex and still not standardized. We present a Personal Computer program for diagnosing types of primary headaches in children. The program calls for the input of each patient's score on five clinical variables chosen by means of discriminant analysis, and the output gives a clinical diagnosis along with its posterior probability. The program was used on an initial group of 223 pediatric patients and was cross-validated at a first level on a second group of 90 patients and at a second level on a third group of 70 patients. The total correct classification figures were 85.2, 90, and 87.1%, respectively.