14,916 research outputs found
Assessing an ontology for the representation of clinical protocols in decision support systems
In order to assess the expressiveness of the CompGuide ontology for Clinical Practice Guidelines, a study was conducted with fourteen students of the Integrated Masters in Biomedical Engineering from the University of Minho in Portugal to whom it was proposed the representation of multiple guidelines according to the ontology. They were then asked to evaluate the ontology through a questionnaire and written reports. Although the results seem promising, there is the need for significant improvements mainly in: the representation of medication prescriptions, the tasks used to retrieve information from the patient, the diversity of actions offered by the ontology, the expressiveness of conditions regarding the state of a patient, and temporal constraints.FCT - Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologiainfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
Informatics: the fuel for pharmacometric analysis
The current informal practice of pharmacometrics as a combination art and science makes it hard to appreciate the role that informatics can and should play in the future of the discipline and to comprehend the gaps that exist because of its absence. The development of pharmacometric informatics has important implications for expediting decision making and for improving the reliability of decisions made in model-based development. We argue that well-defined informatics for pharmacometrics can lead to much needed improvements in the efficiency, effectiveness, and reliability of the pharmacometrics process.
The purpose of this paper is to provide a description of the pervasive yet often poorly appreciated role of informatics in improving the process of data assembly, a critical task in the delivery of pharmacometric analysis results. First, we provide a brief description of the pharmacometric analysis process. Second, we describe the business processes required to create analysis-ready data sets for the pharmacometrician.
Third, we describe selected informatic elements required to support the pharmacometrics and data assembly processes. Finally, we offer specific suggestions for performing a systematic analysis of existing challenges as an approach to defi ning the next generation of pharmacometric informatics
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Proceedings ICPW'07: 2nd International Conference on the Pragmatic Web, 22-23 Oct. 2007, Tilburg: NL
Proceedings ICPW'07: 2nd International Conference on the Pragmatic Web, 22-23 Oct. 2007, Tilburg: N
An ontology to standardize research output of nutritional epidemiology : from paper-based standards to linked content
Background: The use of linked data in the Semantic Web is a promising approach to add value to nutrition research. An ontology, which defines the logical relationships between well-defined taxonomic terms, enables linking and harmonizing research output. To enable the description of domain-specific output in nutritional epidemiology, we propose the Ontology for Nutritional Epidemiology (ONE) according to authoritative guidance for nutritional epidemiology.
Methods: Firstly, a scoping review was conducted to identify existing ontology terms for reuse in ONE. Secondly, existing data standards and reporting guidelines for nutritional epidemiology were converted into an ontology. The terms used in the standards were summarized and listed separately in a taxonomic hierarchy. Thirdly, the ontologies of the nutritional epidemiologic standards, reporting guidelines, and the core concepts were gathered in ONE. Three case studies were included to illustrate potential applications: (i) annotation of existing manuscripts and data, (ii) ontology-based inference, and (iii) estimation of reporting completeness in a sample of nine manuscripts.
Results: Ontologies for food and nutrition (n = 37), disease and specific population (n = 100), data description (n = 21), research description (n = 35), and supplementary (meta) data description (n = 44) were reviewed and listed. ONE consists of 339 classes: 79 new classes to describe data and 24 new classes to describe the content of manuscripts.
Conclusion: ONE is a resource to automate data integration, searching, and browsing, and can be used to assess reporting completeness in nutritional epidemiology
Moving towards a new paradigm of creation, dissemination, and application of computer-interpretable medical knowledge
Computer-Interpretable Guidelines (CIGs)
exploit the scientific strength of evidence-based medicine
to make recommendations available in Clinical Decision
Support Systems. However, systems that deploy
them have not been widely successful, in part due to
the limitations of CIG frameworks in the adoption of
inclusive and open technologies and the use of Artificial
Intelligence techniques as tools to make their systems
stronger and more adaptable. In this work we propose
a web-based CIG framework to tackle some of these
challenges and facilitate the integration of CIG-based
advice not only in the everyday activities of health care
professionals but also in the lives of whoever may need
it.This work has been supported by FCT
– Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia within the Project
Scope UID/CEC/00319/2013. The work of Tiago Oliveira is
supported by a FCT grant with the reference SFRH/BD/8-
5291/ 2012.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
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