Department of Medicine

Welcome to the Section of Decision Sciences and Clinical Systems Modeling (SDS-CSM)

The Section of Decision Sciences and Clinical Systems Modeling (SDS-CSM) was created to enhance the University of Pittsburgh's capabilities in the application of mathematical models to our understanding of disease and the health care system's response. In our work, we apply a wide array of methods from the decision sciences, including decision analysis, cost-effectiveness analysis, simulation modeling, and discrete event simulation. We define the term clinical system quite broadly, incorporating the modeling of a disease or treatment in the "system" of an individual cell, organ, patient, population, or health care delivery system.

Our section currently focuses on three major areas: (1) the development and advancement of methodologic techniques used to model disease and biologic processes, (2) the application of decision sciences techniques to important problems in health and medicine, and (3) the training of clinicians and others in the use and application of these techniques.