Distributed Probabilistic Fuzzy Rule Mining for Clinical Decision Making

Abstract

INTRODUCTION: With the growing size, complexity, and distributivity of databases, efficiency and scalability have become highly desirable attributes of data mining algorithms in decision support systems. OBJECTIVES: This study aims for a computational framework for clinical decision support systems that can handle inconsistent dataset while also being interpretable and scalable. METHODS: This paper proposes a Distributed Probabilistic Fuzzy Rule Mining (DPFRM) algorithm that extracts probabilistic fuzzy rules from numerical data using a self-organizing multi-agent approach. This agent-based method provides better scalability and fewer rules through agent interactions and rule-sharing. RESULTS: The performance of the proposed approach is investigated on several UCI medical datasets. The DPFRM is also used for predicting the mortality rate of burn patients. Statistical analysis confirms that the DPFRM significantly improves burn mortality prediction by at least 3%. Also, the training time is improved by 17% if implemented by a parallel computer. However, this speedup decreases with increased distributivity, due to the added communication overhead. CONCLUSION: The proposed approach can improve the accuracy of decision making by better handling of inconsistencies within the datasets. Furthermore, noise sensitivity analysis demonstrates that the DPFRM deteriorates more robustly as the noise levels increase.