title: Diagnostic tests and information theory.
abstract: Our previous article showed that the discriminating properties of most diagnostic tests in medicine can be characterized by assuming that tests separate disordered and nondisordered individuals into two overlapping, normal distributions with different means and standard deviations. In this article, we explore the relationship between this way of describing diagnostic tests and the reason that clinicians use them: to gain information about their patients and to reduce diagnostic uncertainty.
authors.affiliation: Psychiatry Service, Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH 45220.
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Mossman
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Somoza
mesh_terms: D003937:Diagnosis, Differential; D006801:Humans; D007257:Information Theory; D015233:Models, Statistical; D011237:Predictive Value of Tests