Comparison of machine-learning algorithms to build a predictive model for detecting undiagnosed diabetes ELSA-Brasil: accuracy study

CONTEXT AND OBJECTIVE: Type 2 diabetes is a chronic disease associated with a wide range of serious health complications that have a major impact on overall health. The aims here were to develop and validate predictive models for detecting undiagnosed diabetes using data from the Longitudinal Study of Adult Health (ELSA-Brasil) and to compare the performance of different machine-learning algorithms in this task. DESIGN AND SETTING: Comparison of machine-learning algorithms to develop predictive models using data from ELSA-Brasil. METHODS: After selecting a subset of 27 candidate variables from the literature, models were built and validated in four sequential steps: (i) parameter tuning with tenfold cross-validation, repeated three times; (ii) automatic variable selection using forward selection, a wrapper strategy with four different machine-learning learning algorithms and tenfold cross-validation (repeated three times), to evaluate each subset of variables; (iii) error estimation of model parameters with tenfold cross-validation, repeated ten times; and (iv) generalization testing on an independent dataset. The models were created with the following machine-learning algorithms: logistic regression, artificial neural network, naive Bayes, K-nearest neighbor and random forest. RESULTS: The best models were created using artificial neural networks and logistic regression. These achieved mean areas under the curve of, respectively, 75.24% and 74.98% in the error estimation step and 74.17% and 74.41% in the generalization testing step. CONCLUSION: Most of the predictive models produced similar results, and demonstrated the feasibility of identifying individuals with highest probability of having undiagnosed diabetes, through easily-obtained clinical data.