Understanding clinical decision-making in traditional East Asian medicine through dimensionality reduction: An empirical investigation

This study examines the clinical decision-making processes in Traditional East Asian Medicine (TEAM) by reinterpreting pattern identification (PI) through the lens of dimensionality reduction. Focusing on the Eight Principle Pattern Identification (EPPI) system and utilizing empirical data from the Shang-Han-Lun, we explore the necessity and significance of prioritizing the Exterior-Interior pattern in diagnosis and treatment selection. We test three hypotheses: whether the Ext-Int dimension contains the most information about patient symptoms, represents the most abstract and generalizable symptom information, and facilitates the selection of appropriate herbal prescriptions. Employing quantitative measures (e.g., abstraction index, cross-conditional generalization performance, decision tree regression), our results demonstrate that the Exterior-Interior dimension represents the most abstract and generalizable symptom and herbal prescription information, contributing to the efficient mapping between diagnosis and treatment. This research provides an objective framework for understanding the cognitive processes underlying TEAM, bridging traditional medical practices with modern computational approaches. The findings offer insights into the development of AI-driven diagnostic tools in TEAM and conventional medicine, with the potential to advance clinical practice, education, and research.