Developing Knowledge Based System For Premedical Triage Using Fuzzy Inference Rule Based Approach: The Case Of Menelik Ii Hospital
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Date
2016-01-17
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Addis Ababa University
Abstract
Hospitals and other health centers are organized to help patients because; human health problem
is a serious issue in day to day life. Since the aim of health organizations is to make people to be
productive and healthy, the services that are given by the health centers should be fast and
efficient enough. But there are some gaps observed in the health centers like, low patient
handling capacity of the hospitals, low skill of the triage staff because of lack of experience, lack
of good judgment quality, less tolerance of the patients, lack of enough knowledge etc.
In the case of Ethiopia different problems are observed in health care centers. From different
perspectives, one is the problems observed in the triage system. So the objective of this research
is developing knowledge based system for premedical triage using fuzzy inference rule based
approach.
Interview and document review have been used as a data collection methods. The researcher has
interviewed the domain experts by using unstructured interview, because unstructured interview
is used to get unlimited idea from the domain experts. In order to develop the system, fuzzy
inference logic has been used as a tool. Fuzzy logic is a precise problem solving methodology
which is able to simultaneously handle numerical data and linguistic knowledge. In fuzzy logic, a
statement can assume any real value between 0 and 1, representing the degree to which an
element belongs to a given set.
Hierarchical tree have been used in order to represent the knowledge that are collected from the
domain experts. The hierarchical tree diagram provides the analysts with an effective visual
condensation of the clustering results. The hierarchical tree diagram is one of the most
commonly used methods of determining the number of clusters in this case number of selected
diseases. The numbers at the top and bottom of the hierarchical tree diagram represent equally
spaced values of the criterion function. It gives a pictorial representation of the criterion function
information.
Finally the researcher has tried to develop the system using fuzzy inference system, and the user
acceptance of the system is evaluated by the domain experts. The system gives a significance
contribution for the domain area because the domain experts rated the user acceptance test of the
system as 74.28%. This is because the since the symptoms of the patients are subjective, it is
difficult for fuzzification. In addition to that there is no universal agreement on fuzzifing the
symptoms. The developed system can be able to identify the diseases based on the query given
by the user. The user in this case the triage nurse gives each fuzzified values of the symptoms,
and then the system recommended the possible result in ranking by using percentage. The system
can be able to provide suggestions on the basis of symptoms what will be the recommended
disease and to where further diagnosis will be.
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Keywords
Premedical Triage Using Fuzzy Inference Rule Based Approach