SmartSearch: Automated
Recommendations Using Librarian
Expertise and PubMed E-Utilities
Ryan Max Steinberg, Richard Zwies, Charles Yates, Chris Stave,
Yannick Pouliot, & Heidi Heilemann
Presented by Richard Zwies
Web Production Specialist
Lane Medical Library & Knowledge
Management Center
Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center
A DIVISION OF IRT

Lane Medical Library Website
•! Clinicians, faculty, students, researchers
!!Stanford School of Medicine
!!Stanford Hospital & Clinics
!!Lucile Packard Children's Hospital
!!Palo Alto VA
Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center
A DIVISION OF IRT

A Wealth of Digital Content
•! 5,400 eJournals
•! 6,800 eBooks
•! Clinical/article databases
•! Video lectures, bioinformatics tools,
images, historical materials…
Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center
A DIVISION OF IRT

Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center

Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center

Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center

Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center

Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center

Lane Clinical Metasearch
•! 150 metasearch resources on the
clinical portal
•! Clinical textbooks, handbooks, atlases,
drug databases, and practice
guidelines, article databases
•! Most “gently” used
Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center
A DIVISION OF IRT

Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center

Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center

Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center

Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center

Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center

Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center

Example “DVT”
1.! Query term “DVT”
2.! “Venous Thrombosis” most frequent
heading from PubMed articles
3.! SmartSearch Map:
No “Venous Thrombosis” resources
4.! Climbs MeSH tree to find
“Vascular Diseases”" 3 resources
Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center
A DIVISION OF IRT

Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center

Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center

Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center

Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center

Hypothesis
That resources recommended by the
SmartSearch system would be used
more heavily than peer metasearch
resources not included in the project.
Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center
A DIVISION OF IRT

Methods
•! Website clicks to metasearch resources
(WebTrends)
•! Before & after rollout to SmartSearch
(3 mos. of data each)
•! Linear regression of change (slopes) of
peer resources vs. SmartSearch
resources
Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center
A DIVISION OF IRT

Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center

Results
•! No significant difference between
change in views of peer resources &
SmartSearch resources
•! Slope = 0.3882 ± 0.3296
•! R2 = 0.008927
•! P = 0.2407 (deviates from slope = 0)
Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center
A DIVISION OF IRT

Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center

Next Steps
•! Relocate to clinical search interface
•! Refine the resource & subject maps
•! Recommend people: librarians?
•! Refine the algorithm
•! Other uses?
Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center
A DIVISION OF IRT

Thank you
Richard Zwies, Web Production Specialist
rzwies@stanford.edu
Richard Zwies - Web Production Specialist, Lane Medical Library &
Knowledge Management Center
A DIVISION OF IRT