A Framework to Classify Clinical Data Using a Genetic Algorithm and Artificial Flora-Optimized Neural Network

A new classification framework for a Clinical Decision Support System, utilizing a Genetic algorithm and an Artificial Flora Optimized Neural Network is presented in this paper. GAFON is an artificial neural network whose topology is optimized with Genetic Algorithm and the learnable parameters are optimized with Artificial Flora Optimization algorithm. Drop out technique is used in the topology optimization phase and weight regularization is used in the parameter optimization phase. The proposed method minimizes the co-adaptation problem, reduces over-fitting of training data and improves the generalization of a feed forward neural network. The classification framework developed has been tested for classifying both multi class and binary class clinical datasets. The proposed method attained accuracy values of 86.82% for Hepatitis C Virus (HCV) for Egyptian patients, 84.91% for Vertebral Column 95.65% for Statlog Heart Disease (SHD), SHD and 93.79% for Early Stage Diabetes Risk Prediction (ESDRP), all datasets obtained from UCI repository