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To use the semantic and structural properties in the Unified Medical Language System (UMLS) Metathesaurus to characterize and discover potential relationships.

The Canadian Health Outcomes for Better Information and Care (C-HOBIC) project introduced systematic use of standardized clinical nursing terminology for patient assessments. Implemented so far in three Canadian provinces, C-HOBIC comprises an innovative model for large-scale capture of standardized nursing-sensitive clinical outcomes data within electronic health records (EHRs). To support this activity, nursing assessment and outcomes concepts were mapped to the International Classification for Nursing Practice (ICNP(R)). By comparing serial [...]

OBJECTIVE It is vital to detect the full safety profile of a drug throughout its market life. Current pharmacovigilance systems still have substantial limitations, however. The objective of our work is to demonstrate the feasibility of using natural language processing (NLP), the comprehensive Electronic Health Record (EHR), and association statistics for pharmacovigilance purposes. DESIGN Narrative discharge summaries were collected from the Clinical Information System at New York Presbyterian Hospital (NYPH) [...]

The authors implemented what is possibly the first secure messaging system in a VA Medical Center. Since reimbursement for secure messaging is not of great concern and clinical data systems are fully computerized, several evaluation strategies were used to assess clinical adoption. To address known concerns of clinicians, the authors analyzed secure messaging use and performed a content analysis. Message volumes were low and content analysis demonstrated that messages were [...]

While our Y2K worries about old computers "retiring" at midnight captured the television and news media attention, a more significant "old age" phenomenon snuck onto the scene with hardly a headline: the dawn of the age of the aged. (1) The over burdened health care system will face a worldwide wave of retirees who will live longer, cost more to treat, and demand new goods and services to help them [...]

The Core Content for Clinical Informatics defines the boundaries of the discipline and informs the Program Requirements for Fellowship Education in Clinical Informatics. The Core Content includes four major categories: fundamentals, clinical decision making and care process improvement, health information systems, and leadership and management of change. The AMIA Board of Directors approved the Core Content for Clinical Informatics in November 2008.

The active engagement of consumers is an important factor in achieving widespread success of health information systems. The disability community represents a major segment of the healthcare arena, with more than 50 million Americans experiencing some form of disability. In keeping with the "consumer-driven" approach to e-health systems, this paper considers the distinctive aspects of electronic and personal health record use by this segment of society. Drawing upon the information [...]

Chemical concepts assigned multiple "Chemical Viewed Structurally" semantic types (STs) in the Unified Medical Language System (UMLS) are subject to ambiguous interpretation. The multiple assignments may denote the fact that a specific represented chemical (combination) is a conjugate, derived via a chemical reaction of chemicals of the different types, or a complex, composed of a mixture of such chemicals. The previously introduced Refined Semantic Network (RSN) is modified to properly [...]

Surgical Process Models (SPMs) are models of surgical interventions. The objectives of this study are to validate acquisition methods for Surgical Process Models and to assess the performance of different observer populations.

The Massachusetts eHealth Collaborative (MAeHC) was formed to improve patient safety and quality of care by promoting the use of health information technology through community-based implementation of electronic health records (EHRs) and health information exchange. The Collaborative has recently implemented EHRs in a diverse set of competitively selected communities, encompassing nearly 500 physicians serving over 500,000 patients. Targeting both EHR implementation and health information exchange at the community level has [...]