AUTHOR=Han Chang , Liu Jianghao , Wu Yijun , Chong Yuming , Chai Xiran , Weng Xisheng 

TITLE=To Predict the Length of Hospital Stay After Total Knee Arthroplasty in an Orthopedic Center in China: The Use of Machine Learning Algorithms

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Surgery

VOLUME=Volume 8 - 2021

YEAR=2021

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/surgery/articles/10.3389/fsurg.2021.606038

DOI=10.3389/fsurg.2021.606038

ISSN=2296-875X

ABSTRACT=Abstract
Background and objectives: 
Total knee arthroplasty (TKA) is widely performed to improve mobility and quality of life for symptomatic knee osteoarthritis patients. The accurate prediction of patients’ length of hospital stay (LOS) can help clinicians for rehabilitation decision-making and bed assignment planning, which thus makes full use of medical resources. 
Methods: Clinical characteristics were retrospectively collected from 1,298 patients who received TKA. A total of 36 variables were included to develop predictive models for LOS by multiple ML algorithms. The models were evaluated by the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve for predictive performance and decision curve analysis (DCA) for clinical values. A feature selection approach was used to identify optimal predictive factors. 
Results: By analyzing clinical characteristics, it is feasible to develop ML-based models for the preoperative prediction of LOS for patients who received TKA, and the RFC model performed best.