Toward a Multivariate Prediction Model of Pharmacological Treatment for Women With Gestational Diabetes Mellitus: Algorithm Development and Validation

Background Successful management of gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) reduces the risk of morbidity in women and newborns. A woman’s blood glucose readings and risk factors are used by clinical staff to make decisions regarding the initiation of pharmacological treatment in women with GDM. Mobile health (mHealth) solutions allow the real-time follow-up of women with GDM and allow timely treatment and management. Machine learning offers the opportunity to quickly analyze large quantities of data to automatically flag women at risk of requiring pharmacological treatment. Objective The aim of this study is to assess whether data collected through an mHealth system can be analyzed to automatically evaluate the switch to pharmacological treatment from diet-based management of GDM. Methods We collected data from 3029 patients to design a machine learning model that can identify when a woman with GDM needs to switch to medications (insulin or metformin) by analyzing the data related to blood glucose and other risk factors. Results Through the analysis of 411,785 blood glucose readings, we designed a machine learning model that can predict the timing of initiation of pharmacological treatment. After 100 experimental repetitions, we obtained an average area under the receiver operating characteristic curve of 0.80 (SD 0.02) and an algorithm that allows the flexibility of setting the operating point rather than relying on a static heuristic method, which is currently used in clinical practice. Conclusions Using real-time data collected via an mHealth system may further improve the timeliness of the intervention and potentially improve patient care. Further real-time clinical testing will enable the validation of our algorithm using real-world data.