Modelling Medications for Public Health Research

Authors

  • Deborah van Gaans University of South Australia
  • S Ahmed Centre for Research Excellence in the Prevention of Chronic Conditions in Rural and Remote Populations, University of South Australia, South Australia
  • K D'Onise Centre for Research Excellence in the Prevention of Chronic Conditions in Rural and Remote Populations, University of South Australia, South Australia
  • J Moyon Information Strategy and Technology, University of South Australia, South Australia
  • G Caughey Pharmacy and Medical Sciences, University of South Australia, South Australia
  • R McDermott College of Public Health, Medical and Veterinary Sciences, James Cook University, Queensland

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5210/ojphi.v8i2.6809

Abstract

Most patients with chronic disease are prescribed multiple medications, which are recorded in their personal health records. This is rich information for clinical public health researchers but also a challenge to analyse.  This paper describes the method that was undertaken within the Public Health Research Data Management System (PHReDMS) to map medication data retrieved from individual patient health records for population health researcher’s use.  The PHReDMS manages clinical, health service, community and survey research data within a secure web environment that allows for data sharing amongst researchers.  The PHReDMS is currently used by researchers to answer a broad range of questions, including monitoring of prescription patterns in different population groups and geographic areas with high incidence/prevalence of chronic renal, cardiovascular, metabolic and mental health issues.  In this paper, we present the general notion of abstraction network, a higher level network that sits above a terminology and offers compact and more easily understandable view of its content. We demonstrate the utilisation of abstraction network methodology to examine medication data from electronic medical records to allow a compact and more easily understandable view of its content.

Author Biography

Deborah van Gaans, University of South Australia

B.A., MAppSc., PhD

Manager: Research Data

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Published

2016-08-17

How to Cite

van Gaans, D., Ahmed, S., D’Onise, K., Moyon, J., Caughey, G., & McDermott, R. (2016). Modelling Medications for Public Health Research. Online Journal of Public Health Informatics, 8(2). https://doi.org/10.5210/ojphi.v8i2.6809

Issue

Vol. 8 No. 2 (2016)

Section

Original Articles

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