Query Expansion Using the UMLS ® Metathesaurus ®

Recent work has demonstrated the importance of query expansion for improving retrieval effectiveness when applying statistically-based systems to MEDLINE citations. The research has suggested the use of retrieval feedback for enhancing the original text of users' queries. As an alternative method of query expansion, we propose the use of the MetaMap program for associating UMLS Metathesaurus concepts with the original query. Our experiments show that query expansion based on MetaMap compares favorably with retrieval feedback. We conclude that the optimal strategy would be to combine the two techniques.

[1]  P. Srinivasan.  Retrieval feedback in MEDLINE. , 1996, Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association : JAMIA.

[2]  P Srinivasan.  Retrieval feedback for query design in MEDLINE. A comparison with expert network and LLSF approaches. , 1996, Proceedings : a conference of the American Medical Informatics Association. AMIA Fall Symposium.

[3]  Alan R. Aronson,et al.  Exploiting a Large Thesaurus for Information Retrieval , 1994, RIAO.

[4]  T C Rindflesch,et al.  Ambiguity resolution while mapping free text to the UMLS Metathesaurus. , 1994, Proceedings. Symposium on Computer Applications in Medical Care.

[5]  Padmini Srinivasan,et al.  Optimal Document-Indexing Vocabulary for MEDLINE , 1996, Inf. Process. Manag..

[6]  Padmini Srinivasan,et al.  Query Expansion and MEDLINE , 1996, Inf. Process. Manag..

[7]  W. Bruce Croft,et al.  The INQUERY Retrieval System , 1992, DEXA.

[8]  William R. Hersh,et al.  Research Paper: A Performance and Failure Analysis of SAPHIRE with a MEDLINE Test Collection , 1994, J. Am. Medical Informatics Assoc..

[9]  D. K. Harmon,et al.  Overview of the Third Text Retrieval Conference (TREC-3) , 1996 .

[10]  W. Bruce Croft,et al.  Combining automatic and manual index representations in probabilistic retrieval , 1995 .

[11]  Gerard Salton,et al.  A vector space model for automatic indexing , 1975, CACM.