%0 Journal Article
%T An ontology-based exploration of the concepts and relationships in the activities and participation component of the international classification of functioning, disability and health
%A Vincenzo Della Mea
%A Andrea Simoncello
%J Journal of Biomedical Semantics
%D 2012
%I BioMed Central
%R 10.1186/2041-1480-3-1
%X In the relationship analysis, we used four predicates among those available in SUMO for processes (Patient, Instrument, Agent, and subProcess). While at the top level subsumption was used in most cases (90%), at the lower levels the percentage of other relationships rose to 41%. Chapters were heterogeneous in the relationships used and some of the leaves of the tree seemed to represent properties or parts of the parent concept rather than subclasses. Mapping of ICF to SUMO proved partially feasible, with the activity concepts being mapped mostly (but not totally) under the IntentionalProcess concept in SUMO. On the other hand, the participation concept has not been mapped to any upper level concept.Our analysis of the relationships within ICF revealed issues related to confusion between classes and their properties, incorrect classifications, and overemphasis on subsumption, confirming what already observed by other researchers. However, it also suggested some properties for Activities that could be included in a more formal model: number of agents involved, the instrument used to carry out the activity, the object of the activity, complexity of the task, and an enumeration of relevant subtasks.Terminologies and classifications are particularly crucial in the medical field, as they are widely diffused to represent knowledge in the clinical practice. Perhaps the most known terminologies and classifications are the International Classification of Diseases (ICD) [1] and the Systematized Nomenclature of Medicine (SNOMED) [2].Ontologies are means for specifying the intended meaning of a vocabulary in a logical manner [3]. Depending on generality, we can distinguish between upper (or top-level) and domain ontologies. The former describe very general concepts like space, time, matter, object, event, action, etc., which are independent of a particular problem or domain. The latter describe the vocabulary related to a generic domain or a generic task or activity, by speciali
%U http://www.jbiomedsem.com/content/3/1/1