Artificial Intelligence Methods For a Bayesian Epistemology-Powered
Evidence Evaluation
Abstract
Rationale, aims and objectives: The diversity of safety signals (e.g.,
case reports, animal studies and observational studies) makes the
assessment of the (un-)safety of a drug a formidable challenge. While
frequentist viewpoints to uncertain inference struggle in aggregating
these signals, the more flexible Bayesian approaches seem better suited
for this quest. Artificial Intelligence (AI) offers great promise to
these approaches for information retrieval, decision support and leaning
probabilities from data. E-Synthesis is a Bayesian framework for drug
safety assessments build on philosophical principles and considerations.
It aims to aggregate all the available information, in order to provide
a Bayesian probability of a drug causing an adverse reaction. We
delineate and assess ways in which AI can support E-Synthesis. Results:
We find that AI can help with information retrieval, usability
(graphical decision making aids), learning Bayes factors from historical
data, assessing quality of information and determining conditional
probabilities for the so-called “indicators” of causation for
E-Synthesis. Conclusions: Properly applied, AI can help the transition
of philosophical principles and considerations concerning evidence
aggregation for drug safety to a tool that can be used in practise.