Analysis of individual's serial changes, also referred to as the physiological, pathophysiological, medical or health dynamics, is the backbone of
medical diagnosis, monitoring and patient healthcare management. However, such an analysis is complicated by enormous intra-individual and inter-individual variability. To address this problem, a novel serial-
analysis method and
system based on the concept of personalized basis functions (PBFs) is disclosed. Due to more accurate reference information provided by the PBFs, individual's changes associated with specific physiological activity or a sequence, transition or combination of activities (for example, a transition from sleep to
wakefulness and transition from rest to exercise) can be monitored more accurately. Hence, subtle but clinically important changes can be detected earlier than using other methods. A
library of individual's PBFs and their transition probabilities (which can be described by Hidden Markov Models) can completely describe individual's physiological dynamics. The
system can be adapted for healthcare
information management, diagnosis, medical decision support, treatment and side-effect control. It can also be adapted for guiding health, fitness and wellness training, subject identification and more efficient management of clinical trials.