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Checking the quality of clinical guidelines using automated reasoningtools

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 November 2008

ARJEN HOMMERSOM
Affiliation:
Section on Model-based System Development, Institute for Computing and Information Sciences, Radboud University Nijmegen, PO Box 9010, 6500 GL Nijmegen, The Netherlands (e-mail: arjenh@cs.ru.nl, peterl@cs.ru.nl, pvb@cs.ru.nl)
PETER J. F. LUCAS
Affiliation:
Section on Model-based System Development, Institute for Computing and Information Sciences, Radboud University Nijmegen, PO Box 9010, 6500 GL Nijmegen, The Netherlands (e-mail: arjenh@cs.ru.nl, peterl@cs.ru.nl, pvb@cs.ru.nl)
PATRICK VAN BOMMEL
Affiliation:
Section on Model-based System Development, Institute for Computing and Information Sciences, Radboud University Nijmegen, PO Box 9010, 6500 GL Nijmegen, The Netherlands (e-mail: arjenh@cs.ru.nl, peterl@cs.ru.nl, pvb@cs.ru.nl)
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Abstract

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Requirements about the quality of clinical guidelines can be represented byschemata borrowed from the theory of abductive diagnosis, using temporal logicto model the time-oriented aspects expressed in a guideline. Previously, we haveshown that these requirements can be verified using interactive theorem provingtechniques. In this paper, we investigate how this approach can be mapped to thefacilities of a resolution-based theorem prover, otter and acomplementary program that searches for finite models of first-order statements,mace-2. It is shown that the reasoning required for checking thequality of a guideline can be mapped to such a fully automated theorem-provingfacilities. The medical quality of an actual guideline concerning diabetesmellitus 2 is investigated in this way.

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Type
Regular Papers
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2008