A learning support tool with clinical cases based on concept maps and medical entity recognition

The search for truthful health information through Internet is an increasingly complex process due to the growing amount of resources. Access to information can be difficult to control even in environments where the goal pursued is well-defined, as in the case of learning activities with medical students. In this paper, we present a computer tool devised to ease the process of understanding medical concepts from information in clinical case histories. To this end, it automatically constructs concept maps and presents reliable information from different ontologies and knowledge bases. The two main components of the system are an Intelligent Information Access interface and a Concept Map Graph that retrieves medical concepts from a text input, and provides rich information and semantically related concepts. The paper includes a user evaluation of the first component and a systematic assessment for the second component. Results show that our proposal can be efficient and useful for students in a medical learning environment.