Retrieving Rare Cases: A Protocol for Searching Complex Medical Cases

Abstract

This study sought to provide a protocol for searching complex medical cases of grand rounds. A clinical informationist was embedded in gastroenterology grand rounds to use comprehensive search strategies and summarize patients’ information through concept mapping. Our proposed protocol classifies into three categories: (1) The general search strategy, (2) The protocol for searching for evidence about rare diseases, and (3) Identifying other resources more than routine medical databases. This approach represents a novel method beyond previous studies which were focused on usual ward rounds to facilitate evidence-based decision-making by providing and simplifying a comprehensive summary view of complex medical cases.

Keywords:

• Concept formation
• grand rounds
• information retrieval
• rare diseases
• teaching rounds

Acknowledgements

The authors thank all members of the Gastroenterology Department of Alzahra Hospital for their collaboration and assistance in developing this study.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

All data underlying this article are available in the article.

Authors contributions

FZ and PA contributed to the concept and design of the study, and developed the methodology. EZ collected the data. FZ supervised the work. EZ drafted the initial article. All authors contributed to the interpretation of the results, editing, and review of the article and provided approval for publication.

Notes

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Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Vice-Chancellery for Research and Technology [grant number 396,008]; Isfahan University of Medical Sciences, Isfahan, Iran.

Notes on contributors

Elahe Zare-Farashbandi

Elahe Zare-Farashbandi, MSc ([email protected]), Clinical Informationist Research Group, Health Information Technology Research Center, Isfahan University of Medical Sciences, Isfahan, Iran.

Peyman Adibi

Peyman Adibi, Professor ([email protected]), Integrative Functional Gastroenterology Research Center, Isfahan University of Medical Sciences, Isfahan, Iran.

Firoozeh Zare-Farashbandi

Firoozeh Zare-Farashbandi, Associate Professor ([email protected]), Health Information Technology Research Center, Isfahan University of Medical Sciences, Isfahan, Iran.