Report Number: CS-TR-99-1619
Institution: Stanford University, Department of Computer Science
Title: Intelligent Alarms: Allocating Attention Among Concurrent
Processes
Author: Huang, Cecil
Date: April 1999
Abstract: I have developed and evaluated a computable, normative
framework for intelligent alarms: automated agents that
allocate scarce attention resources to concurrent processes
in a globally optimal manner. My approach is
decision-theoretic, and relies on Markov decision processes
to model time-varying, stochastic systems that respond to
externally applied actions. Given a collection of continuing
processes and a specified time horizon, my framework
computes, for each process: (1) an attention allocation,
which reflects how much attention the process is awarded, and
(2) an activation price, which reflects the process's
priority in receiving the allocated attention amount.
I have developed a prototype, Simon, that computes these
alarm signals for a simulated ICU. My validity experiments
investigate whether sensible input results in sensible
output. The results show that Simon produces alarm signals
that are consistent with sound clinical judgment. To assess
computability, I used Simon to generate alarm signals for an
ICU that contained 144 simulated patients; the entire
computation took about 2 seconds on a machine with only
moderate processing capabilities. I thus conclude that my
alarm framework is valid and computable, and therefore is
potentially useful in a real-world ICU setting.
http://i.stanford.edu/pub/cstr/reports/cs/tr/99/1619/CS-TR-99-1619.pdf