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THALIS: Human-Machine Analysis of Longitudinal Symptoms in Cancer Therapy
Journal article   Peer reviewed

THALIS: Human-Machine Analysis of Longitudinal Symptoms in Cancer Therapy

Carla Floricel, Nafiul Nipu, Mikayla Biggs, Andrew Wentzel, Guadalupe Canahuate, Lisanne Van Dijk, Abdallah Mohamed, C David Fuller and G Elisabeta Marai
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON VISUALIZATION AND COMPUTER GRAPHICS, Vol.28(1), pp.151-161
2022
DOI: 10.1109/TVCG.2021.3114810
url
https://arxiv.org/pdf/2108.02817View
Open Access

Abstract

Although cancer patients survive years after oncologic therapy, they are plagued with long-lasting or permanent residual symptoms, whose severity, rate of development, and resolution after treatment vary largely between survivors. The analysis and interpretation of symptoms is complicated by their partial co-occurrence, variability across populations and across time, and, in the case of cancers that use radiotherapy, by further symptom dependency on the tumor location and prescribed treatment. We describe THALIS, an environment for visual analysis and knowledge discovery from cancer therapy symptom data, developed in close collaboration with oncology experts. Our approach leverages unsupervised machine learning methodology over cohorts of patients, and, in conjunction with custom visual encodings and interactions, provides context for new patients based on patients with similar diagnostic features and symptom evolution. We evaluate this approach on data collected from a cohort of head and neck cancer patients. Feedback from our clinician collaborators indicates that THALIS supports knowledge discovery beyond the limits of machines or humans alone, and that it serves as a valuable tool in both the clinic and symptom research.

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