Our inter-disciplinary research program interleaves scien
tific investigations in AI methods of machine learning, semantic web, ontologies, knowledge graphs and explainable AI, coupled with the development and implementation of practical digital health systems. Our research program purports a translation of scientific research to practical healthcare solutions.
The unifying theme of the NICHE research group is AI for healthcare, conducting research in:
(a) Knowledge-centric methods of semantic web, ontologies, knowledge graphs, knowledge representation and reasoning. Our research focuses on the computerization, execution and translation of text-based standardized healthcare knowledge (such as clinical guidelines, clinical workflows, clinical algorithms, medical literature and behavioural theories) with the intent to provide point-of-need guideline based decision support for care providers; guideline integration for multimorbidity decision support; personalized behaviour change strategies; clinical workflow optimization; patient triaging, personalized patient education content; literature based knowledge discovery; and so on.
(b) Data analytics methods of machine learning, deep learning, visual analytics, and explainable AI. Our research aims to analyze multi-modal health data for predictive modeling of treatment outcomes, disease progression, chronic disease risk, health resource demands; survival analysis for organ transplants and ICU patients; activity recognition for assisted living; phenotyping of heterogeneous patient populations; health system use optimization; environmental impact on health; and so on.
(c) Digital health technologies to develop and implement point-of-care and point-of-need healthcare solutions in terms of clinical decision support systems; health system operational data visualization dashboards; mobile health apps for behaviour modification, patient education and activity monitoring; lifetime health monitoring; speech recognition for transcribing physician’s notes; chatbots for patient empowerment; and so on.