Clustering cliques for graph-based summarization of the biomedical research literature

BACKGROUND: Graph-based notions are increasingly used in biomedical data mining and knowledge discovery tasks. In this paper, we present a clique-clustering method to automatically summarize graphs of semantic predications produced from PubMed citations (titles and abstracts). RESULTS: SemRep is used to extract semantic predications from the citations returned by a PubMed search. Cliques were identified from frequently occurring predications with highly connected arguments filtered by degree centrality. Themes contained in the summary were identified with a hierarchical clustering algorithm based on common arguments shared among cliques. The validity of the clusters in the summaries produced was compared to the Silhouette-generated baseline for cohesion, separation and overall validity. The theme labels were also compared to a reference standard produced with major MeSH headings. CONCLUSIONS: For 11 topics in the testing data set, the overall validity of clusters from the system summary was 10% better than the baseline (43% versus 33%). While compared to the reference standard from MeSH headings, the results for recall, precision and F-score were 0.64, 0.65, and 0.65 respectively

Continua: The reference architecture of a personal telehealth ecosystem

The Continua Health Alliance, which was started in 2006 to enable an interoperable personal telehealth ecosystem, has become a major force in the personal telehealth domain. Within one year after the release of the Version One Design Guidelines over a dozen interoperable products have been officially Continua Certified and many more are coming. In parallel Continua continued its technical developments and has since made great progress on defining interoperability for the LAN and WAN interfaces, and with that now enables end-to-end interoperability. In this paper we motivate why the establishment of such an ecosystem is an essential part in addressing the healthcare challenges in society and why it is essential to address interoperability. The paper introduces the Continua Health Alliance and describes in detail the Continua end-to-end architecture and guidelines, including its security aspects

Post-COVID condition in patients with inflammatory rheumatic diseases:a prospective cohort study in the Netherlands

Background: Studies on long-term consequences of COVID-19, commonly referred to as post-COVID condition, in patients with inflammatory rheumatic diseases are scarce and inconclusive. Furthermore, classifying patients with inflammatory rheumatic diseases as having post-COVID condition is complicated because of overlapping symptoms. Therefore, we investigated the risk of post-COVID condition and time until recovery, and compared the prevalence of symptoms seen in post-COVID condition, between patients with inflammatory rheumatic diseases and healthy controls, with and without a history of COVID-19. Methods: In this substudy we used data from an ongoing prospective cohort study in the Netherlands. All adult patients with inflammatory rheumatic diseases from the Amsterdam Rheumatology and Immunology Center in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, were invited to participate in the study between April 26, 2020, and March 1, 2021. All patients were asked, but not obliged, to recruit their own control participant of the same sex, of comparable age (< 5 years), and without an inflammatory rheumatic disease. Demographic and clinical data, including data on the occurrence of SARS-CoV-2 infections, were collected via online questionnaires. On March 10, 2022, all study participants received a questionnaire on the occurrence, onset, severity, and duration of persistent symptoms during the first 2 years of the COVID-19 pandemic, independent of their history of SARS-CoV-2 infection. Additionally, we prospectively monitored a subset of participants who had a PCR or antigen confirmed SARS-CoV-2 infection in the 2-month period surrounding the questionnaire in order to assess COVID-19 sequelae. In line with WHO guidelines, post-COVID condition was defined as persistent symptoms that lasted at least 8 weeks, started after the onset and within 3 months of a PCR or antigen-confirmed SARS-CoV-2 infection, and could not be explained by an alternative diagnosis. Statistical analyses included descriptive statistics, logistic regression analyses, logistic-based causal mediation analyses, and Kaplan-Meier survival analyses for time until recovery from post-COVID condition. In exploratory analyses, E-values were calculated to investigate unmeasured confounding. Findings: A total of 1974 patients with inflammatory rheumatic disease (1268 [64%] women and 706 [36%] men; mean age 59 years [SD 13]) and 733 healthy controls (495 [68%] women and 238 [32%] men; mean age 59 years [12]) participated. 468 (24%) of 1974 patients with inflammatory rheumatic disease and 218 (30%) of 733 healthy controls had a recent SARS-CoV-2 omicron infection. Of those, 365 (78%) of 468 patients with inflammatory rheumatic disease and 172 (79%) of 218 healthy controls completed the prospective follow-up COVID-19 sequelae questionnaires. More patients than controls fulfilled post-COVID condition criteria: 77 (21%) of 365 versus 23 (13%) of 172 (odds ratio [OR] 1·73 [95% CI 1·04–2·87]; p=0·033). The OR was attenuated after adjusting for potential confounders (adjusted OR 1·53 [95% CI 0·90–2·59]; p=0·12). Among those without a history of COVID-19, patients with inflammatory diseases were more likely to report persistent symptoms consistent with post-COVID condition than were healthy controls (OR 2·52 [95% CI 1·92–3·32]; p<0·0001). This OR exceeded the calculated E-values of 1·74 and 1·96. Recovery time from post-COVID condition was similar for patients and controls (p=0·17). Fatigue and loss of fitness were the most frequently reported symptoms in both patients with inflammatory rheumatic disease and healthy controls with post-COVID condition. Interpretation: Post-COVID condition after SARS-CoV-2 omicron infections was higher in patients with inflammatory rheumatic disease than in healthy controls based on WHO classification guidelines. However, because more patients with inflammatory rheumatic disease than healthy controls without a history of COVID-19 reported symptoms that are commonly used to define a post-COVID condition during the first 2 years of the pandemic, it is likely that the observed difference in post-COVID condition between patients and controls might in part be explained by clinical manifestations in the context of underlying rheumatic diseases. This highlights the limitations of applying current criteria for post-COVID condition in patients with inflammatory rheumatic disease, and suggests it might be appropriate for physicians to keep a nuanced attitude when communicating the long-term consequences of COVID-19. Funding: ZonMw (the Netherlands organization for Health Research and Development) and Reade foundation