Abstract
The statistical regression model is one of the most frequently used clinical analysis methods. It has basic assumption of linearity, additivity and normal distribution of data. However, most of biological data in medical field are nonlinear and unevenly distributed. To overcome the discrepancy between the basic assumption of statistical model and actual biological data, we propose a new analytical method based on artificial neural network. The newly developed multilayer perceptron(MLP) is trained with 120 data set (60 normal, 60 patient). On applying test data, it shows the discrimination power of 0.76. The diabetic risk factors were also identified from the MLP neural network model and the logistic regression model. The signigicant risk factors identified by MLP model were post prandial glucose level(PP2), sex(male), fasting blood sugar(FBS) level, age, SBP, AC and WHR. Those from the regression model are sex(male), PP2, age and FBS. The combined risk factors can be identified using the MLP model. Those are total cholesterol and body weight, which is consistent with the result of other clinical studies. From this experiment we have learned that MLP can be applied to the combined risk factor analysis of biological data which can not be provided by the conventional statistical method.