Machine learning and deep learning approaches for predicting diabetes progression: a comparative analysis

The global burden of diabetes mellitus (DM) continues to escalate, posing significant challenges to healthcare systems worldwide. This study compares machine learning (ML) and deep learning (DL) methods, their hybrids, and ensemble strategies for predicting the health outcomes of diabetic patients. This work aims to find the best solutions that strike a balance between computational efficiency and accurate prediction. The study systematically assessed a range of predictive models, including sophisticated DL techniques and conventional ML algorithms, based on computational efficiency and performance indicators. The study assessed prediction accuracy, processing speed, scalability, resource consumption, and interpretability using publicly accessible diabetes datasets. It methodically evaluates the selected models using key performance indicators (KPIs), training times, and memory usage. AdaBoost had the highest F1-score (0.74) on PIMA-768, while RF excelled on PIMA-2000 (~0.73). An RNN led the 3-class BRFSS survey (0.44), and a feed-forward DNN excelled on the binary BRFSS subset (0.45), while RF also achieved perfect accuracy on the EMR dataset (1.00) confirming that model performance is tightly coupled to each dataset’s scale, feature mix and label structure. The results highlight how lightweight, interpretable ML and DL models work in resource-constrained environments and for real-time health analytics. The study also compares its results with existing prediction models, confirming the benefits of selected ML approaches in enhancing diabetes-related medical outcomes that are substantial for practical implementation, providing a reliable and efficient framework for automated diabetes prediction to support initiative-taking disease management techniques and tailored treatment. The study concludes the essentiality of conducting a thorough assessment and validation of the model using current institutional datasets as this enhances accuracy, security, and confidence in AI-assisted healthcare decision-making.