CADIAG-IV/Rheumatology - An Internet-Based Consultation System for Differential Diagnosis in Rheumatology

CADIAG-I, -II and -III (Computer-Assisted DIAGnosis) are diagnostic consultation systems, which, given a list of symptoms, signs, test results, and clinical findings for a patient, provide diagnostic hypotheses (confirmed, possible, and excluded) and proposals for further examinations (Adlassnig, 1980; Adlassnig et al., 1985b, 1986). One of their most important features is that the physician gains a greater awareness of rare diseases. In addition to being a consultation system, CADIAG-IV, the latest version of the CADIAG series supports comprehensive patient management and administration by use of the integrated patient data and medical knowledge base, MedFrame (Bögl, 1997; Kolousek, 1997). This framework consists of two major components: a class library for storing patient data and medical knowledge on the one hand, and a set of tools for implementing Client/Server-based medical consultation systems on the other.

CADIAG-IV/Rheumatology is a part of the project CADIAG-IV. Its goal is to develop an Internet-based consultation system for decision support in the field of rheumatic diseases. A further goal that is closely linked with CADIAG-IV/Rheumatologyis the design and development of the medical consultation system shell, MedFrame/CADIAG-IV.