An Appraisal and Operating Characteristics of Major ML Methods Applicable in Healthcare and Health Science

Abstract

AbstractThis chapter provides an outline of most major biomedical ML methods in a manner suitable for both readers who have not delved into ML before, and readers who may already know about some or all of these methods. The former will find here a useful introduction and review. The latter will find additional insights as we critically revisit the key concepts and add summary guidance on whether and when each technique is applicable (or not) in healthcare and health science problem solving. Toward that end, for each technique, we introduce a “Method Label”, akin to a drug label, which provides distilled information about the techniques at a glance. The method labels present the primary and secondary uses of each technique, provide context of use, describe the principles of operation, and summarize important theoretical and empirical properties.