A temporal model for Clinical Data Analytics language.

The proposal of a special purpose language for Clinical Data Analytics (CliniDAL) is presented along with a general model for expressing temporal events in the language. The temporal dimension of clinical data needs to be addressed from at least five different points of view. Firstly, how to attach the knowledge of time based constraints to queries; secondly, how to mine temporal data in different CISs with various data models; thirdly, how to deal with both relative time and absolute time in the query language; fourthly, how to tackle internal time-event dependencies in queries, and finally, how to manage historical time events preserved in the patient's narrative. The temporal elements of the language are defined in Bachus Naur Form (BNF) along with a UML schema. Its use in a designed taxonomy of a five class hierarchy of data analytics tasks shows the solution to problems of time event dependencies in a highly complex cascade of queries needed to evaluate scientific experiments. The issues in using the model in a practical way are discussed as well.