Checking the Quality of Clinical Guidelines using Automated Reasoning Tools

Abstract: Requirements about the quality of clinical guidelines can be represented by schemata borrowed from the theory of abductive diagnosis, using temporal logic to model the time-oriented aspects expressed in a guideline. Previously, we have shown that these requirements can be verified using interactive theorem proving techniques. In this paper, we investigate how this approach can be mapped to the facilities of a resolution-based theorem prover, Otter, and a complementary program that searches for finite models of first-order statements, Mace. It is shown that the reasoning required for checking the quality of a guideline can be mapped to such fully automated theorem-proving facilities. The medical quality of an actual guideline concerning diabetes mellitus 2 is investigated in this way.