Extracting body function information using rule-based methods: Highlighting structure and formatting challenges in clinical text.

This paper describes the identification of body function (BF) mentions within the clinical text within a large, national, heterogeneous corpus to highlight structural challenges presented by the clinical text. BF in clinical documents provides information on dysfunction or impairments in the function or structure of organ systems or organs. BF mentions are embedded in highly formatted structures where the formats include implied scoping boundaries that confound existing natural language processing segmentation and document decomposition techniques. This paper describes follow-up work to adapt a rule-based system created using National Institutes of Health records to a larger, more challenging corpus of Social Security Administration data. Results of these systems provide a baseline for future work to improve document decomposition techniques.

Diagnosis and management of lateral semicircular canal benign paroxysmal positional vertigo.

OBJECTIVE: Describe the diagnosis, treatment, and outcome of a group of 20 patients with lateral semicircular canal benign paroxysmal positional vertigo (LSC-BPPV). STUDY DESIGN AND SETTING: Retrospective review of 20 patients with LSC-BPPV (10 with geotropic and 10 with apogeotropic nystagmus) presenting to a tertiary balance center. Diagnosis was confirmed with infrared nystagmography in Dix-Hallpike positioning tests and supine positional tests. Patients were treated with one or more particle repositioning maneuvers. RESULTS: Addition of supine positional nystagmus tests to Dix-Hallpike positioning testing improves sensitivity in the diagnosis of LSC-BPPV. Treatment outcomes in the apogeotropic LSC-BPPV group were poorer than the geotropic LSC-BPPV group. SIGNIFICANCE: Adding supine positional testing to routine vestibular diagnostic testing will increase the identification of LSC-BPPV. Apogeotropic LSC-BPPV is more challenging to treat.