Medical diagnostic and predictive therapeutic method using discriminant analysis

摘要

A diagnostic method and predictor of prognosis from various therapeutic treatments is provided using discriminant analysis statistics. In one form, a patient is identified as having a disease using discriminant analysis when one or more values of a physiological parameter of the patient is closer to that of a previously characterized group of individuals having a disease and the patient is diagnosed as not having the disease, or healthy, if the value of a patient's parameter is closer to that of individuals previously characterized as healthy, or not having the disease. For example, the parameters can be based on the autonomic and/or enteric nervous system. Advantageously, the present method can be readily adapted using conventional linear discriminant analysis statistics to factor more than one parameter between a patient and one or more previously classified groups, to thereby enhance predictability and reliability of the present method. Further, in another form, linear discriminant analysis is used to predict outcomes of various therapeutic treatments of a disease to which a patient is afflicted by comparing the value or values of one or more patient parameter with respective ones in previously characterized individuals having the same affliction which have been treated either successfully or unsuccessfully.