Applying Machine Learning to Predict Complex Clinical Course in Youth With Eating Disorders.

Objective: To compare the predictive performance of supervised machine learning models to logistic regression in identifying youth with eating disorders at risk of a complex clinical course based on clinical characteristics from the first treatment episode. Methods: Clinical data from 327 youth trea...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Publicado en:International Journal of Eating Disorders Vol. 59; no. 1; pp. 134 - 146
Autores principales: Ryall, Stephanie, Bradley, Abigail, El Emam, Khaled, Obeid, Nicole
Formato: Artículo
Publicado: Wiley-Blackwell Jan2026
Materias:
Acceso en línea:Ver este registro en EBSCOhost
fields @attributes:
  recordID: 1
pdfLink:
plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ssf&AN=190687308&site=ehost-live
header:
  @attributes:
    shortDbName: ssf
    uiTerm: 190687308
    longDbName: Social Sciences Full Text (H.W. Wilson)
    uiTag: AN
  controlInfo:
    bkinfo:
    jinfo:
      jid:
        02763478
        IJD
      jtl: International Journal of Eating Disorders
      issn: 02763478
      maglogo: Y
    pubinfo:
      dt: Jan2026
      vid: 59
      iid: 1
      pid: 480
      pub: Wiley-Blackwell
    artinfo:
      ui:
        190687308
        10.1002/eat.24570
      ppf: 134
      ppct: 12
      formats:
      tig:
        atl: Applying Machine Learning to Predict Complex Clinical Course in Youth With Eating Disorders.
      aug:
        au:
          Ryall, Stephanie
          Bradley, Abigail
          El Emam, Khaled
          Obeid, Nicole
        affil:
          Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario Research Institute, Ottawa Ontario,, Canada
          Faculty of Medicine, University of Ottawa, Ottawa Ontario,, Canada
          School of Epidemiology and Public Health, University of Ottawa, Ottawa Ontario,, Canada
      su:
        Ontario
        Treatment of eating disorders
        Body weight
        Retrospective studies
        Eating disorders
        Stature
        Anthropometry
        Disease risk factors
        Adolescence
        Risk assessment
        Random forest algorithms
        Boosting algorithms
        Prediction models
        Academic medical centers
        Body mass index
        Logistic regression analysis
        Patient readmissions
        Symptoms
        Children's hospitals
        Tertiary care
        Descriptive statistics
        Longitudinal method
        Support vector machines
        Medical records
        Acquisition of data
        Machine learning
        Comparative studies
        Data analysis software
        Hospital care of teenagers
        Sensitivity & specificity (Statistics)
        Disease progression
      sug:
        subj:
          Treatment of eating disorders
          Body weight
          Retrospective studies
          Eating disorders
          Stature
          Anthropometry
          Disease risk factors
          Adolescence
          Ontario
          Specialty (except Psychiatric and Substance Abuse) Hospitals
          General Medical and Surgical Hospitals
          Paediatric hospitals
          Risk assessment
          Random forest algorithms
          Boosting algorithms
          Prediction models
          Academic medical centers
          Body mass index
          Logistic regression analysis
          Patient readmissions
          Symptoms
          Children's hospitals
          Tertiary care
          Descriptive statistics
          Longitudinal method
          Support vector machines
          Medical records
          Acquisition of data
          Machine learning
          Comparative studies
          Data analysis software
          Hospital care of teenagers
          Sensitivity & specificity (Statistics)
          Disease progression
      keyword:
        clinical course
        eating disorders
        machine learning
        prediction
        random forest
        clinical course
        eating disorders
        machine learning
        prediction
        random forest
      ab: Objective: To compare the predictive performance of supervised machine learning models to logistic regression in identifying youth with eating disorders at risk of a complex clinical course based on clinical characteristics from the first treatment episode. Methods: Clinical data from 327 youth treated at any level of care at the Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario Eating Disorders Program (2018–2024) were extracted. Complex clinical course outcome was defined as either readmission after discharge or a treatment trajectory deviating from the expected step‐down in intensity, including return to the same or escalation to a higher level of care. Thirty‐four intake and discharge variables from the first treatment episode were used to train seven machine learning models and logistic regression using repeated nested cross‐validation. Performance was assessed by AUC and brier scores. Models using intake‐only versus intake plus discharge data were compared. A parsimonious model using the top 10 predictors was also evaluated. Results: Random forest model with intake and discharge data achieved the best performance (AUC = 0.723; Brier = 0.176) that was significantly superior to logistic regression. Models trained on intake‐only data showed poor discrimination (AUCs < 0.6). Including discharge data improved model performance across all algorithms. The most important predictor was weight change throughout treatment. Random forest performance declined when restricted to the top 10 predictors. Discussion: Supervised machine learning demonstrates improved predictive performance for eating disorder disease course outcomes compared to traditional statistical methods, especially in higher‐dimensionality settings. These findings support future application of machine learning to complex biopsychosocial datasets to advance precision medicine initiatives in the eating disorder field and better understand the etiology of disease trajectory.
      pubtype: Academic Journal
      doctype: Article
      src: R
    language: English
    refInfo:
    copyright:
      @attributes:
        flag: N
    holdings:
      @attributes:
        islocal: N