Pre-compiling medical logic modules into C++ in building medical decision support systems

Area of Science:

• Medical Informatics
• Computer Science in Medicine

Background:

• Medical knowledge base development is resource-intensive and fragmented across institutions.
• Sharing and transferring medical knowledge is hindered by diverse representation formats.
• Standardized knowledge representation is crucial for interoperability in healthcare.

Purpose of the Study:

• To present a method for developing medical decision support systems (DSS) using Arden Syntax.
• To introduce a pre-compiler tool for translating Arden Syntax Medical Logic Modules (MLMs) into C++.
• To evaluate the advantages of using C++ for implementing medical knowledge.

Main Methods:

• Knowledge formulated using Arden Syntax.
• Development of a Medical Logic Module (MLM) pre-compiler.
• Translation of MLMs into the object-oriented programming language C++.
• Implementation of decision support systems based on the translated C++ code.

Main Results:

• A functional pre-compiler capable of translating Arden Syntax MLMs to C++ was developed.
• The C++ approach facilitates the creation of robust and efficient medical decision support systems.
• Demonstrated feasibility of creating interoperable medical knowledge representations.

Conclusions:

• The proposed method effectively supports the development of shareable medical knowledge bases.
• Utilizing Arden Syntax with a C++ pre-compiler enhances knowledge transfer and system development efficiency.
• The C++ approach offers significant advantages for building advanced medical decision support systems.