Using Web resources to construct multilingual medical thesaurus for cross-language medical information retrieval

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Bibliographic Details
Title: Using Web resources to construct multilingual medical thesaurus for cross-language medical information retrieval
Authors: Lu, Wen-Hsiang1, Lin, Ray S.2, Chan, Yi-Che1, Chen, Kuan-Hsi1
Source: Decision Support Systems. Jun2008, Vol. 45 Issue 3, p585-595. 11p.
Subjects: Multilingual thesauri, Cross-language information retrieval, Communication barriers, Digital resources in medicine, Information services, Thesauri, Internet searching, Information resources management
Abstract: Due to the language barrier, non-English users are unable to retrieve the most updated medical information from the U.S. authoritative medical websites, such as PubMed and MedlinePlus. However, currently, there is no any cross-language medical information retrieval (CLMIR) system that can help Chinese-speaking consumers cross the language barrier in finding useful English medical information. A few CLMIR systems utilize MeSH (Medical Subject Headings) to help overcome the language barrier. Unfortunately, the traditional Chinese version of MeSH is currently unavailable. In this paper, we employ a semi-automatic term translation method to construct a Chinese–English MeSH by exploiting abundant multilingual Web resources, including Web anchor texts and search–result pages. Through this method, we have developed a Chinese–English Mesh Compilation System to assist knowledge engineers in compiling a Chinese–English medical thesaurus with more than 19,000 entries. Furthermore, this thesaurus has been used to develop a prototypical system for cross-language medical information retrieval, MMODE, which can help consumers retrieve top-quality English medical information using Chinese terms. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]
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Database: Engineering Source
Description
Abstract:Due to the language barrier, non-English users are unable to retrieve the most updated medical information from the U.S. authoritative medical websites, such as PubMed and MedlinePlus. However, currently, there is no any cross-language medical information retrieval (CLMIR) system that can help Chinese-speaking consumers cross the language barrier in finding useful English medical information. A few CLMIR systems utilize MeSH (Medical Subject Headings) to help overcome the language barrier. Unfortunately, the traditional Chinese version of MeSH is currently unavailable. In this paper, we employ a semi-automatic term translation method to construct a Chinese–English MeSH by exploiting abundant multilingual Web resources, including Web anchor texts and search–result pages. Through this method, we have developed a Chinese–English Mesh Compilation System to assist knowledge engineers in compiling a Chinese–English medical thesaurus with more than 19,000 entries. Furthermore, this thesaurus has been used to develop a prototypical system for cross-language medical information retrieval, MMODE, which can help consumers retrieve top-quality English medical information using Chinese terms. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]
ISSN:01679236
DOI:10.1016/j.dss.2007.07.004