title: Using Arden Syntax to identify registry-eligible very low birth weight neonates from the Electronic Health Record.
abstract: Condition-specific registries are essential resources for supporting epidemiological, quality improvement, and clinical trial studies. The identification of potentially eligible patients for a given registry often involves a manual process or use of ad hoc software tools. With the increased availability of electronic health data, such as within Electronic Health Record (EHR) systems, there is potential to develop healthcare standards based approaches for interacting with these data. Arden Syntax, which has traditionally been used to represent medical knowledge for clinical decision support, is one such standard that may be adapted for the purpose of registry eligibility determination. In this feasibility study, Arden Syntax was explored for its ability to represent eligibility criteria for a registry of very low birth weight neonates. The promising performance (100% recall; 97% precision) of the Arden Syntax approach at a single institution suggests that a standards-based methodology could be used to robustly identify registry-eligible patients from EHRs.
authors.affiliation: University of Vermont, Burlington, VT.
authors.forename: Indra Neil
authors.initials: IN
authors.lastname: Sarkar
authors.affiliation: University of Vermont, Burlington, VT.
authors.forename: Elizabeth S
authors.initials: ES
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.affiliation: University of Vermont, Burlington, VT ; Vermont Children's Hospital at Fletcher Allen Health Care, Burlington, VT.
authors.forename: Paul T
authors.initials: PT
authors.lastname: Rosenau
authors.affiliation: University of Vermont, Burlington, VT.
authors.forename: Matthew B
authors.initials: MB
authors.lastname: Storer
authors.affiliation: Vermont Oxford Network, Burlington, VT.
authors.forename: Beth
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Anderson
authors.affiliation: University of Vermont, Burlington, VT ; Vermont Oxford Network, Burlington, VT.
authors.forename: Jeffrey D
authors.initials: JD
authors.lastname: Horbar
mesh_terms: D057286:Electronic Health Records; D057208:Health Level Seven; D006801:Humans; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D019102:Infant, Very Low Birth Weight; D011381:Programming Languages; D012042:Registries