A proof of concept for epidemiological research using structured reporting with pulmonary embolism as a use case

Objective:This paper studies the possibilities of an integrated IT-based workflow for epidemiological research in pulmonary embolism using freely available tools and structured reporting.Methods:We included a total of 521 consecutive cases which had been referred to the radiology department for computed tomography pulmonary angiography (CTPA) with suspected pulmonary embolism (PE). Free-text reports were transformed into structured reports using a freely available IHE-MRRT-compliant reporting platform. D-dimer values were retrieved from the hospitals laboratory results system. All information was stored in the platform's database and visualized using freely available tools. For further analysis, we directly accessed the platform's database with an advanced analytics tool (RapidMiner).Results: We were able developed an integrated workflow for epidemiological statistics from reports obtained in clinical routine. The report data allowed for automated calculation of epidemiological parameters. Prevalence of p...