Natural language processing of lifestyle modification documentation. (March 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Shoenbill, Kimberly; Song, Yiqiang; Gress, Lisa; Johnson, Heather; Smith, Maureen; Mendonca, Eneida A
• Other Names: Bian Jiang guest-editor.; Modave Francois guest-editor.
• Is Part Of: Health informatics journal. Volume 26:Number 1(2020)
• Page Start: 388
• Page End: 405
• Publication Date: 2020-03
• Subjects: electronic health records -- health behavior -- hypertension -- lifestyle -- natural language processing -- text mining; Medical informatics -- Periodicals; 610.285
• DOI: 10.1177/1460458218824742
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1460-4582

Abstract

Lifestyle modification, including diet, exercise, and tobacco cessation, is the first-line treatment of many disorders including hypertension, obesity, and diabetes. Lifestyle modification data are not easily retrieved or used in research due to their textual nature. This study addresses this knowledge gap using natural language processing to automatically identify lifestyle modification documentation from electronic health records. Electronic health record notes from hypertension patients were analyzed using an open-source natural language processing tool to retrieve assessment and advice regarding lifestyle modification. These data were classified as lifestyle modification assessment or advice and mapped to a coded standard ontology. Combined lifestyle modification (advice and assessment) recall was 99.27 percent, precision 94.44 percent, and correct classification 88.15 percent. Through extraction and transformation of narrative lifestyle modification data to coded data, this critical information can be used in research, metric development, and quality improvement efforts regarding care delivery for multiple medical conditions that benefit from lifestyle modification.