The Center for Biomedical Informatics
State University of Campinas, Brazil
Research Abstracts
A SOFTWARE LABORATORY FOR TEACHING KNOWLEDGE ENGINEERING TO
HEALTH PROFESSIONALS
Renato M.E. Sabbatini
Chair of Medical Informatics, Faculty of Medical Sciences,
and Center for Biomedical Informatics, State University of Campinas,
Brazil.
The process of creating computer-usable knowledge bases (KB)
is complex, lengthy and still poorly understood by most health care
professionals. Thus, there is a clear need for intermediate courses
which teach knowledge engineering (KE) concepts and methods for these
professionals. Understanding better its steps and requirements, they
will be able to interact more efficiently with expert system builders.
We describe here a suite of 12 microcomputer programs developed
expressly for the purpose of the practical teaching of the most common
KE techniques and its applications in Medicine and Biology. This is a
one-semester, 64-hour course ministered at graduate level at the
Biomedical Engineering program; which addresses theoretically and
practically the main methods used to develop decision-making tools. The
participants are a mix of physicians, human biologists, nurses and
biomedical engineers pursuing a Master's degree either in Medicine,
Physiology or Biomedical Engineering. For each method, the students
receive a small, easy-to-use microcomputer program which includes a
worked-out example and several proposed exercises, based on real
decision-making problems in Medicine, in the following areas:
algorithm-based systems (programs TIREO and RISKMAM), binary and
quantitative pattern classification (BINREC and CURVCLAS), Bayesian
probability (BAYES) and fuzzy systems (FUZZY), tree-, net-, frame- and
rule-based logic programming (DECTREE, SEMANET, FRAMES and EXPERTMD,
respectively), adaptive logic (EXPERGEN) and connectionist systems
(NEURONET). The programs are small programmable "shell" systems and
have been designed in Turbo BASIC 1.0 (Borland), with a common user
interface, for IBM/PC-compatible microcomputers. They are now available
in the public domain. Although limited in time, the course has been
able to provide the students with a working knowledge on the scope and
methods of computer-based KE in the Health Sciences and has achieved a
good success. The extensive practical work with programs and examples
related to medical problems has improved the students' motivation and
understanding of the basic methodological approaches.
Published in:
Second IMIA International Conference on Medical Informatics and Medical
Education, Prague, Czechoslovakia, September 1990.
Last Updated: March 2, 1996
renato@sabbatini.com
