The networks from medical knowledge and clinical practice have small-world,scale-free,and hierarchical features |
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Authors: | Yutaka Tachimori Hiroaki Iwanaga Takashi Tahara |
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Affiliation: | 1. Department of Social Welfare, Nihon Fukushi University, Chita-gun, Aichi, 470-3295, Japan;2. Institute for Basic Medical and Welfare Research, Chuou-ku, Fukuoka, 810-0051, Japan |
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Abstract: | Here, we constructed and analyzed a network (henceforth, “medical knowledge network”) derived from a commonly used medical text. We show that this medical knowledge network has small-world, scale-free, and hierarchical features. We then constructed a network from data from a hospital information system that reflected actual clinical practice and found that this network also had small-world, scale-free, and hierarchical features. Moreover, we found that both the diagnosis frequency distribution of the hospital network and the diagnosis degree distribution of the medical knowledge network obeyed a similar power law. These findings suggest that the structure of clinical practice may emerge from the mutual influence of medical knowledge and clinical practice, and that the analysis of a medical knowledge network may facilitate the investigation of the characteristics of medical practice. |
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Keywords: | Small-world Scale-free Complex network Natural language Medical knowledge |
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