Biomedical subjects

J M Aronis

Publications and source records attributed to J M Aronis.

3 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed1999

Identifying patient subgroups with simple Bayes'.

Medical records can form the basis of retrospective studies, be used to evaluate hospital practices and guidelines, and provide examples for teaching medicine. Each of these tasks presumes the ability to accurately identify patient subgroups. We describe a method for selecting patient subgroups based on the text of their medical records and demonstrate its effectiveness. We also describe a modification of the basic system that does not assume the existence of a preclassified training set, and illustrate its effectiveness in one retrieval task.

Artificial Intelligence↗

PubMed1996

Poinsettia exposures have good outcomes...just as we thought.

The poinsettia (Euphorbia pulcherrima) is a much-maligned plant which is thought by the public and some health professionals to be extremely toxic. Despite pronouncements by public health officials to the contrary, the poinsettia continues to be recognized as a poisonous plant. To determine if there was any validity to the toxicity claims, 849,575 plant exposures reported to the American Association of Poison Control Centers were electronically analyzed. Poinsettia exposures accounted for 22,793 cases and formed the subset that was analyzed to critically evaluate the morbidity and mortality associated with poinsettia exposures. There were no fatalities among all poinsettia exposures and 98.9% were accidental in nature, with 93.3% involving children. The majority of exposed patients (96.1%) were not treated in a health care facility and 92.4% did not develop any toxicity related to their exposure to the poinsettia. Most patients do not require any type of therapy and can be treated without referral to a health care facility.

Adolescent↗

PubMed1996

Plant exposures: a state profile of the most common species.

Plant exposures are the fourth most common cause of poisoning and 86% of those exposures involve the pediatric population. The large number of plant-related exposures and the lack of knowledge about plant toxicity has led to plant paranoia and considerable educational efforts to reduce the number of exposures. These efforts are often dictated by misconceptions and folklore. AAPCC TESS data on all plant exposures for the years 1985-1994 were electronically analyzed by plant species and state to establish a frequency distribution in the US. Aggregate national data was also tabulated. A total of 912,534 plant exposures were analyzed to tabulate the top 30 plant exposures for each state. Philodendron species were the most common exposures, followed by Dieffenbachia species, Euphorbia pulcherrima, Capsicum annuum and Ilex species. There were considerable differences between states relating to indoor vs outdoor plants and native vs introduced varieties. Plant exposures are common and poison information centers devote significant clinical service and educational effort to manage them and to enhance public awareness. Recognition of specific plant species and exposure frequency in a poison center region can be a basis for staff education and the development of appropriate poison prevention education brochures. This can direct better utilization of poison center's resources.

Data Collection↗