Predicting Drug-Resistant Epilepsy – A Machine Learning Approach Based on Administrative Claims Data

November 15, 2018

Patients with drug-resistant epilepsy (DRE) are at high risk of morbidity and mortality, yet their referral to specialist care is frequently delayed. The ability to identify patients at high risk of DRE at the time of treatment initiation, and to subsequently steer their treatment pathway toward more personalized interventions, has high clinical utility.

Here, researchers aim to demonstrate the feasibility of developing algorithms for predicting DRE using machine learning methods. Patients were characterized using 1270 features reflecting demographics, comorbidities, medications, procedures, epilepsy status, and payer status.

The model predicted drug resistance approximately 2 years before patients in the test dataset had failed two antiepileptic drugs (AEDs). Machine learning models constructed using claims data predicted which patients are likely to fail ?3 AEDs and are at risk of developing DRE at the time of the first AED prescription. The use of such models can ensure that patients with predicted DRE receive specialist care with potentially more aggressive therapeutic interventions from diagnosis, to help reduce the serious sequelae of DRE.