A Multilingual, Relational Database of Health Evidence

Gabriel Rada, Daniel Capurro, Daniel PerezEpistemonikos foundation

Episte…what?

EPISTEMONIKOS(ΕΠΙΣΤΗΜΟΝΙΚΟΣ )

What is worth knowing

Who we areEpistemonikos is a nonprofit organization based in Santiago, Chile

Our mission is “to bring high quality information closer to health decision making”

The problem: information overload

New oral anticoagulants in atrial fibrillation

The problem is you dont know the secrets of PubMed

("Atrial Fibrillation"[Mesh] OR "Atrial Flutter"[Mesh] OR ((atrial OR auricular) AND (fibrillation* OR flutter*)) OR AF[Text Word]) AND ("Factor Xa/antagonists AND inhibitors"[Mesh] OR ((factor xa OR factors 10a OR fXa OR autoprothrombin c OR thrombokinase) AND inhibit[Text Word]) OR (activated AND (factor x OR factors 10) AND inhibitor*) OR xabans[Text Word] OR (antistasin OR apixaban OR betrixaban OR du 176b OR eribaxaban OR fondaparinux OR idraparinux OR otamixaban OR razaxaban OR rivaroxaban OR aygin OR ym 150 OR ym150 OR LY517717 OR darexaban OR edoxaban OR SSR126517E) OR ((dabigatran OR BIBR1048) OR ximelagatran OR AZD0837))

Oooops…..but you can search

“systematic reviews” [best evidence]

Much better, ah?Yoy can start reading

…see ya!

8 systematic reviews for my question

Wake up!!! You have to read them, compare which

studies they include….and beg they are well conducted, say the same thing and address the same

studies. Out of bed, sleepyhead!!!

The challenge: to separate the wheat from the chaff

23,000,000 records only in PubMed

• 0,25% are systematic reviews

Our goal

TO AGGREGATE ALL THE RELEVANT HEALTH EVIDENCE (FOR DECISION-MAKING) INTO A SINGLE DATABASE.

www.epistemonikos.org

•Free•Released 1 year ago

•Multilingual interface•Multilingual search•Translations of abstracts

What evidence?

Systematic reviewsOverviews of reviewsHigh-quality structured summariesPrimary studies included in systematic reviews

Systematic reviews (SR) at the centre

• The average SR takes about 1-year of work

• We rescue that effort by storing identified studies

From: http://www.navigatingeffectivetreatments.org.au/understanding_systematic_reviews.html The Centre for Health Communication and Participation with support from the Australasian Cochrane Centre

All that effort into a single database

If the reviewers found it, we’ve got it

Unpublished!!!

Where do we search? 19 databases

How do we feed Epistemonikos?

• Combination of machine technology and human collaboration

Automatic search and upload

Selection of actual systematic reviews by a network of collaborators

Extraction of the studies included in the systematic review

1

2

3

RECORDS(Studies, reviews,

overviews)

RELATIONS

TRANSLATIONS

Not just recordsADDED VALUE

ADDITIONAL DATA

(metadata)

VISUALIZATION

Relations are stored in the database

New anticoagulants for atrial fibrillation

The numbers

• 158,211 records• 30,651 systematic reviews– The world’s biggest collection of certified

systematic reviews• 109,889 primary studies• +200 collaborators

Other 16 databases RELATIONS

TRANSLATIONS

Not just recordsADDED VALUE

ADDITIONAL DATA

(metadata)

VISUALIZATION

Cochrane

Dare

Pubmed

Epistemonikos

How Epistemonikos compares to existing resources?

Let’ see an example

New oral anticoagulants in atrial fibrillation

All the evidence (systematic reviews and studies) for our question *The matrix of evidence is expected to be released at the end of this year

Conclusions

• One-stop shop for evidence• Multilingual database• User friendly• Relation between articles answering a similar

question• Visualisation of ‘all the evidence’ for a specific

question

Many thanks!!

Contact us:contact@epistemonikos.org radagabriel@epistemonikos.org

…or follow us in your preferred language:English: @epistemonikosSpanish: @epistemonikosEsGerman: @epistemonikosDeFrench: @epistemonikosFr

….also in Facebook and google+

Portuguese: @epistemonikosPtItalian: @epistemonikosItArabic: @epistemonikosArDutch: @epistemonikosNlChinese: @epistemonikosZh