Abstract
Background/Aims Informatics for Integrating Biology & the Bedside (I2B2) offers a dynamic graphical interface for querying VDW data. Part of the I2B2 effort involves designing the drop-down menu of standardized nomenclatures provided by coding schemes such as CPT-4, ICD-9, and RxNorm, by which the user queries the data. This menu of content hierarchies can be complex in terms of the number of nodes and levels of nested folders. In addition, there often isn’t an established way to organize these codes into categorization scheme that allows for a clean and organized querying interface.
Methods We will demonstrate the use of SAS and SQL to craft these hierarchies and how to leverage the resources provided by the Unified Medical Language System (UMLS) along with resources that may be available at your local site.
Results We have been able to develop an ontology that spans many of the VDW content areas including Procedures, Diagnoses, Pharmacy Fills, Vitals, Demographics, Tumor, and Enrollment.
Conclusions It is possible to build an ontology that organizes the various coding schemes using SAS and SQL, sourcing public resources such as UMLS. Therefore, our knowledge about building an ontology can be readily transferred across HMORN sites and other consults, empowering additional I2B2 deployments. The development of an ontology for VDW subject areas may have additional uses insofar as organizing standard nomenclatures in a programmatic way is useful.
