Extracting and Measuring Uncertain Biomedical Knowledge from Scientific Statements

TL;DR

This study introduces a novel method for extracting and quantifying uncertain biomedical knowledge from scientific statements, focusing on cardiovascular research in China, using entropy-based metrics to identify key uncertain knowledge areas.

Contribution

The paper presents a new approach combining SPO triple extraction with entropy and uncertainty metrics to measure biomedical knowledge uncertainty at multiple levels.

Findings

Scientific publication and SPO triple counts grow linearly.

Uncertain cue words are more frequent in specific sentence types.

Major uncertain knowledge areas identified include biomarkers and therapies.

Abstract

Purpose: This study aims to develop a novel approach to extracting and measuring uncertain biomedical knowledge from scientific statements. Design/methodology/approach: Taking cardiovascular research publications in China as a sample, we extracted the SPO triples as knowledge unit and the hedging/conflicting uncertainties as the knowledge context. We introduced Information Entropy and Uncertainty Rate as potential metrics to quantity the uncertainty of biomedical knowledge claims represented at different levels, such as the SPO triples (micro level), as well as the semantic type pairs (micro-level). Findings: The results indicated that while the number of scientific publications and total SPO triples showed a liner growth, the novel SPO triples occurring per year remained stable. After examining the frequency of uncertain cue words in different part of scientific statements, we found hedging words tend to appear in conclusive and purposeful sentences, whereas conflicting terms often appear in background and act as the premise (e.g., unsettled scientific issues) of the work to be investigated. Practical implications: Our approach identified major uncertain knowledge areas, such as diagnostic biomarkers, genetic characteristics, and pharmacologic therapies surrounding cardiovascular diseases in China. These areas are suggested to be prioritized in which new hypotheses need to be verified, and disputes, conflicts, as well as contradictions to be settled further.