A drug mix and dose decision algorithm for individualized type 2 diabetes management

Abstract

Pharmacotherapy guidelines for type 2 diabetes (T2D) emphasize patient-centered care, but applying this approach effectively in outpatient practice remains challenging. Data-driven treatment optimization approaches could enhance individualized T2D management, but current approaches cannot account for drug-specific and dose-dependent variations in safety and efficacy. We developed and evaluated an AI Drug mix and dose Advisor (AIDA) for glycemic management, using electronic medical records from 107,854 T2D patients in the SingHealth Diabetes Registry. Given a patient’s medical profile, AIDA leverages a predict-then-optimize approach to identify the minimal drug mix and dose changes required to optimize glycemic control, subject to clinical knowledge-based guidelines. On unseen data from large internal, external, and temporal validation sets, AIDA recommendations were estimated to improve post-visit glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c) by an average of 0.40–0.68% over standard of care (P < 0.0001). In qualitative evaluations on 60 diverse cases by a panel of three endocrinologists, AIDA recommendations were mostly rated as reasonable and precise. Finally, AIDA’s ability to account for drug-dose specifics offered several advantages over competing methods, including greater consistency with practice preferences and clinical guidelines for practical but effective options, indication-based treatments, and renal dosing. As AIDA provides drug-dose recommendations to improve outcomes for individual T2D patients, it could be used for clinical decision support at point-of-care, especially in resource-limited settings.