Biomedical Language and Format for Manual and Computer Applications

¹ Division of Scientific Activities, American Medical Association

1. Certain problems of medical documentation and the handling of clinical data are related to: a) the excessive number of words used for the naming of diseases and description of manifestations; b) the pressures of medical practice interfering with timely and effective recording of data; and, c) scarcity of paramedical personnel especially medical record librarians to expedite the processing and communication of medical information.

2. CMT is being revised to reduce the number of different names for the same diseases and the multiplicity of descriptors and qualifiers.

3. While CMT is computer-oriented for automation in diagnosis and teaching, the primary goal is in serving as a system of reference to facilitate the "patterns" of clinical manifestations.

4. The Thesaurus of Medical Descriptors (TMD) is being prepared as a companion volume of CMT especially the listing of principal descriptors and qualifiers for reference in the preparation of medical records for manual purposes and automation.

5. The techniques under consideration for the introduction of data into the computer, based on the concepts of CMT and TMD, include "direct" methods e.g., by typerwriter, or by "indirect" procedures including the video screen and matrices implemented with the electric pointer.