J Neuropsychiatry Clin Neurosci 1991; 3:398-404
Copyright © 1991 by American Neuropsychiatric Association
Differential diagnosis of dementia: a comparison between the expert system EVINCE and clinicians
LA Plugge, FR Verhey and J Jolles
Department of Neuropsychology and Psychobiology, University of Limburg, The Netherlands.
The diagnostic performance of the expert system EVINCE was compared with
that of 85 clinicians in diagnosing 10 patients suspected of suffering from
dementia. A multidisciplinary expert committee provided a standard
diagnosis as reference for comparison. The results showed that the syndrome
and etiologic diagnoses made by EVINCE were in very close agreement with
those of the expert committee and that the diagnostic performance of EVINCE
was better than that of the average clinician. The present findings
indicate that expert systems, especially those within the realm of complex
multidimensional medical problems, could be a valuable aid in medical
practice.
