Project Details:

Securing and structural updating of information in the NPU coding system and its environment

Project No.:2006-012-1-700
Start date:2006-07-01
End date:2011-12-31
Division:Chemistry and Human Health Division
Objective:
To extract, analyse and preserve less accessible information producedduring the first decade of development of the IFCC-IUPAC coding system,and specify the needs for information management in the future.Toproduce a manual describing how the basic principles of the codingsystem are implemented in actual coding practise.
Description:
Work under C-NPU defining and coding properties in laboratory science has been going on since the mid-nineties. The database structure designed in the nineties was intended mainly to support the actual coding process (assembly of elements into coded properties), and the production of text files with specific fonts and formatting, intended for paper based publication.

Terminological information about the elements, their sources and their uses in coded properties has been stored, but frequently in an implicit manner, as part of other information elements, rather than explicitly in the database.

During almost a decade of coding work, principles and rules for the coding practise have crystallised, but have not been systematically filed. They may be extracted from stored material, like advice to users at laboratories, newsletters retiring 'malformed' codes etc., or they may be present as 'silent information' in the coding environment - i.e. in the minds of the people working with the system.

A review of the information present in the system and its environment is suggested, aiming to analyse and extract implicitly stored data and register 'silent knowledge'. The objective is to preserve the information, to render it accessible for future developers and users, and to specify the needs for structured information management in the future.

Progress:

> project announcement published in Chem. Int. Mar-Apr 2007, p. 19

Feb 2011 - Implicit information in the original database concerning e.g. terminological sources has been extracted. The LabTerm database at the Danish Board of Health http://www.sst.dk/EnglishNPU is at present holding and publishing an updated version of the NPU terminology with explicit representation of these data.

The information structure of the terminology has been reworked. A logical model for a bilingual NPU database has been described. This model was implemented in the Danish NPU database in 2008. It has proved a satisfactory basis for full scale management of the NPU terminology, including versioning. The Danish logical model is available in English [see NPU_logical_model_v_1.2.pdf].The logical model has been communicated to IFCC as support for the intended transfer of the NPU terminology to the IFCC website by 2009. However, due to lack of resources IFCC has not been able to take over the management of NPU terminology. The Danish Board of Health is the repository of the terminology till further notice.

Principles and guidelines for the management and use of the NPU terminology have been collected from various sources, including ‘silent information’ in the working environment of the terminology. A ‘Manual document’ is close to being finalized, and it will be submitted to PAC in 2011, thereby completing the project.

Dec 2011 - project completed - The principles and guidelines have been worked into a User's Guide. It is published by PAC as a part of the series "IFCC-IUPAC Properties and units in the clinical laboratory sciences": Part XXIII. The NPU terminology, principles, and implementation: A user's guide (IUPAC Technical Report), prepared for publication by Ulla Magdal Petersen, René Dybkær and Henrik Olesen, Pure Appl. Chem., 2012, Vol. 84, No. 1, pp. 137-165 (http://dx.doi.org/10.1351/PAC-REP-11-05-03) 

page last updated 20120105