Machine Learning to Determine Dynamically Evolving New-Onset Venous Thromboembolic (VTE) Event Risk in Hospitalized Patients

NIH RePORTER · NIH · F31 · $17,002 · view on reporter.nih.gov ↗

Abstract

Failure to rescue (FTR), a nurse-sensitive national metric of health care quality, refers to death of a hospitalized patient from a treatable complication, and is potentiated by failure to recognize and appropriately respond to early signs of complications. There is a paucity of research examining patient features predictive of FTR complications. Such information could shift the current paradigm of nursing surveillance to earlier recognition, prevention and treatment of FTR complications, thereby saving lives. New-onset venous thromboembolism (VTE), an FTR complication occurring as either a deep vein thrombosis (DVT) or a pulmonary embolism (PE), is the leading cause of preventable hospital death, carrying a high risk of mortality and a national cost burden of $7 billion annually. VTE is a complex disease process involving interactions between clinical risk factors and acquired and/or inherited susceptibilities to thrombosis. Although biomarkers and clinical factors associated with VTE have been identified, clinical manifestations are subtle, presenting gradually over hours to days. Current VTE risk assessment models (RAM), the cornerstone of prevention, have limited utility due to their complexity and lack of reliability, generalizability and external validation. A critical gap in VTE risk modeling research is that while new-onset VTE pathology evolves over the course of hospitalization, no current models incorporate the progressive accrual of dynamic patient data and pattern evolution over time in their modeling approaches. The totality of routinely collected electronic health record (EHR) data is massive in terms of volume, variety, and production at a rapid velocity in real-time. Such big data could be used in machine learning (ML) analytic approaches to process time series clinical data to identify subtle, evolving feature patterns predictive of new-onset VTE and address this gap. This study proposes to assemble a large scale, multi-source, multi-dimensional VTE study dataset, and in tandem, systematically define the EHR data elements associated with a new-onset VTE diagnosis for computable phenotype algorithm development. We will then apply machine learning analytic approaches to baseline and accruing intensive time series clinical data in the curated dataset to develop models identifying data patterns and features predictive of dynamically evolving new-onset VTE in adult hospitalized patients. This proposal aligns with NINR’s strategic vision for nurse scientists to employ new strategies for collecting and analyzing complex big data sets to permit better understanding of the biological underpinnings of health, and improve ways nurses prevent and manage illness. This innovative study and individualized training plan under a strong and well- established team, represents initial steps in the applicant’s research trajectory focused on data science approaches to predict FTR complication risk, and develop, implement and test dynamic RAMs to info...

Key facts

NIH application ID
10219195
Project number
5F31NR018102-03
Recipient
UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH AT PITTSBURGH
Principal Investigator
Tiffany Purcell Pellathy
Activity code
F31
Funding institute
NIH
Fiscal year
2020
Award amount
$17,002
Award type
5
Project period
2018-09-01 → 2020-12-31