Health Professionals – Semantic Search

Professional search engines are leaning towards increasing sophistication to provide access to diagnostically accurate, peer reviewed and validated information physicians.

The race is on to find the most efficient way for health professionals to search for clinical images, textbook/journal articles or answers to key clinical questions. Traditionally this search has been labor intensive and frustrating unless searching for a specific journal article or the user is happy to sift through hundreds of abstracts to find the right articles to review.

The classic journal search stalwarts have been PubMed and MedlinePlus which allow searching by topics, authors or journals. The evolution and ontological derivation and semantic search is changing the way we perform search and added a deeper layer of complexity in the interrogation of the wealth of defined medical knowledge. There are many players in this field and we shall review each in turn over a series of blogs.

• GoPubMed – Blog review and official website
• SearchMedica – Blog review and official website
• Hakia – PubMed – Blog review and official website
• Cognition – Medline – Blog review and official website

Further information on the semantic web and its implications can be found in an online interview with Peter Novakovic on TechNation Australia Part 1 and Part 2.

Most of the alternative search engines rely on answering a question, but also on phrases and keywords. Be sure to enter your question with appropriate punctuation and capitalization to get the best results. AltSearchEngine review on medical term searching adds a further revealing insight