TY - JOUR
T1 - Evaluating the representation of disaster hazards in SNOMED CT
T2 - gaps and opportunities
AU - Lokmic-Tomkins, Zerina
AU - Block, Lorraine J.
AU - Davies, Shauna
AU - Reid, Lisa
AU - Ronquillo, Charlene Esteban
AU - von Gerich, Hanna
AU - Peltonen, Laura Maria
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2023. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Medical Informatics Association.
PY - 2023/11
Y1 - 2023/11
N2 - OBJECTIVE: Climate change, an underlying risk driver of natural disasters, threatens the environmental sustainability, planetary health, and sustainable development goals. Incorporating disaster-related health impacts into electronic health records helps to comprehend their impact on populations, clinicians, and healthcare systems. This study aims to: (1) map the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction and International Science Council (UNDRR-ISC) Hazard Information Profiles to SNOMED CT International, a clinical terminology used by clinicians, to manage patients and provide healthcare services; and (2) to determine the extent of clinical terminologies available to capture disaster-related events. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Concepts related to disasters were extracted from the UNDRR-ISC's Hazard Information Profiles and mapped to a health terminology using a procedural framework for standardized clinical terminology mapping. The mapping process involved evaluating candidate matches and creating a final list of matches to determine concept coverage. RESULTS: A total of 226 disaster hazard concepts were identified to adversely impact human health. Chemical and biological disaster hazard concepts had better representation than meteorological, hydrological, extraterrestrial, geohazards, environmental, technical, and societal hazard concepts in SNOMED CT. Heatwave, drought, and geographically unique disaster hazards were not found in SNOMED CT. CONCLUSION: To enhance clinical reporting of disaster hazards and climate-sensitive health outcomes, the poorly represented and missing concepts in SNOMED CT must be included. Documenting the impacts of climate change on public health using standardized clinical terminology provides the necessary real time data to capture climate-sensitive outcomes. These data are crucial for building climate-resilient healthcare systems, enhanced public health disaster responses and workflows, tracking individual health outcomes, supporting disaster risk reduction modeling, and aiding in disaster preparedness, response, and recovery efforts.
AB - OBJECTIVE: Climate change, an underlying risk driver of natural disasters, threatens the environmental sustainability, planetary health, and sustainable development goals. Incorporating disaster-related health impacts into electronic health records helps to comprehend their impact on populations, clinicians, and healthcare systems. This study aims to: (1) map the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction and International Science Council (UNDRR-ISC) Hazard Information Profiles to SNOMED CT International, a clinical terminology used by clinicians, to manage patients and provide healthcare services; and (2) to determine the extent of clinical terminologies available to capture disaster-related events. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Concepts related to disasters were extracted from the UNDRR-ISC's Hazard Information Profiles and mapped to a health terminology using a procedural framework for standardized clinical terminology mapping. The mapping process involved evaluating candidate matches and creating a final list of matches to determine concept coverage. RESULTS: A total of 226 disaster hazard concepts were identified to adversely impact human health. Chemical and biological disaster hazard concepts had better representation than meteorological, hydrological, extraterrestrial, geohazards, environmental, technical, and societal hazard concepts in SNOMED CT. Heatwave, drought, and geographically unique disaster hazards were not found in SNOMED CT. CONCLUSION: To enhance clinical reporting of disaster hazards and climate-sensitive health outcomes, the poorly represented and missing concepts in SNOMED CT must be included. Documenting the impacts of climate change on public health using standardized clinical terminology provides the necessary real time data to capture climate-sensitive outcomes. These data are crucial for building climate-resilient healthcare systems, enhanced public health disaster responses and workflows, tracking individual health outcomes, supporting disaster risk reduction modeling, and aiding in disaster preparedness, response, and recovery efforts.
KW - climate change
KW - disaster nursing
KW - disasters
KW - hazards
KW - standardized terminology
KW - systematized nomenclature of medicine clinical terms (SNOMED CT)
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85174641075&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1093/jamia/ocad153
DO - 10.1093/jamia/ocad153
M3 - Article
C2 - 37558235
AN - SCOPUS:85174641075
SN - 1067-5027
VL - 30
SP - 1762
EP - 1772
JO - Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association
JF - Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association
IS - 11
ER -
