title: The impact of vascular diameter ratio on hemodialysis maturation time: Evidence from data mining approaches and thermodynamics law.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Vascular Access (VA) is an important aspect for blood circulatory in Hemodialysis (HD). Arteriovenous Fistula (AVF) is a suitable procedure to gain VA. Maturation of the AVF is a status of AVF, which can be cannulated for HD. This study aimed to discover the parameters that effectively reduce the duration between VA and start of HD, which symbolizes the maturation time (MT).
  
  
  METHODS
  Ninety-six patients who underwent AVF creation were selected for this study. The decision tree method was used based on CART/C4.5 algorithm, which is one of the data mining approaches for data classification. Vascular diameter ratio (VDR) coefficient was obtained (VDR=Artery/Vein diameters).
  
  
  RESULTS
  We investigated the relationship between the VDR and MT in this study and found that MT is reversely related to VDR in elderly patients, while this relation was direct in younger patients.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The analysis revealed a Spearman's correlation coefficient for Vein diameter with MT. MT decreases when diameters of vein and artery are close to one another. This study can help the surgeons to identify high- risk patients who elongate MT for HD.
authors.affiliation: PhD candidate, Department of Information Technology Management, Science and Research Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran. mrezapour@srbiau.ac.ir.
authors.forename: Mohammad
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Rezapour
authors.affiliation: Master of Science in Physics, Department of Physics, Zanjan University, Zanjan, Iran. somayeh.taran@gmail.com.
authors.forename: Somayeh
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Taran
authors.affiliation: Software Engineering, Computer Engineering Faculty, Shahid Beheshti University, Tehran, Iran. Mahmoodymail@ymail.com.
authors.forename: Mahmood
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Balin Parast
authors.affiliation: Associate Professor of Surgery, Hasheminejad Kidney Center, Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.khavaninzadeh.m@iums.ac.ir.
authors.forename: Morteza
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Khavanin Zadeh
keywords: Data Mining; Hemodialysis; Maturation Time; Thermodynamics; Vascular Diameter Ratio