PopHR: a knowledge‐based platform to support integration, analysis, and visualization of population health data

Abstract

Population health decision makers must consider complex relationships between multiple concepts measured with differential accuracy from heterogeneous data sources. Population health information systems are currently limited in their ability to integrate data and present a coherent portrait of population health. Consequentially, these systems can provide only basic support for decision makers. The Population Health Record (PopHR) is a semantic web application that automates the integration and extraction of massive amounts of heterogeneous data from multiple distributed sources (e.g., administrative data, clinical records, and survey responses) to support the measurement and monitoring of population health and health system performance for a defined population. The design of the PopHR draws on the theories of the determinants of health and evidence-based public health to harmonize and explicitly link information about a population with evidence about the epidemiology and control of chronic diseases. Organizing information in this manner and linking it explicitly to evidence is expected to improve decision making related to the planning, implementation, and evaluation of population health and health system interventions. In this paper, we describe the PopHR platform and discuss the architecture, design, key modules, and its implementation and use.

Public Health Surveillance Systems: Recent Advances in Their Use and Evaluation

“…Data integration also poses a challenge in chronic disease surveillance, where, given the multifactorial causation and complex progression of most chronic conditions, surveillance systems tend to follow multiple indicators concurrently. One strategy that is being explored to support the effective use of such information draws on the concept of evidence-based public health (13) and presents indicators in the context of existing evidence to help users appreciate patterns in the data and identify actions that are likely to improve population health (75).…”

Glossary for public health surveillance in the age of data science

“…39 The concept of the PopHR was subsequently developed further, noting that its primary purpose is to support efficient and effective public health practice, that it should be based on an explicit population health framework and that it should make available indicators that document the current status and influences of the health of a defined population. 40 While PopHR systems have yet to be adopted widely in public health practice, researchers have developed and implemented demonstration systems, 33 along with formal ontologies to support information integration in a PopHR. 41…”

Semantic and Dweller-Based Decision Support System for the Reconfiguration of Domestic Environments: RecAAL

“…In Reference [19], the authors described an adaptive mediation system (ARIEN) leveraging ontologies to provide an accurate and seamless integration of heterogeneous medical data, enhancing data interoperability. To tackle the issues of the health-related concepts measured with differential accuracy from diverse data sources, the authors of Reference [20] designed a semantic-based application (PopHR), that was able to automates the integration and extraction of health-related data; the application uses an ontological framework to describe data relevant to chronic diseases. Ontologies are also exploited to normalize and integrate structured and unstructured data from multiple sources.…”