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A -- ENHANCED ANATOMICAL KNOWLEDGE SOURCES FOR UMLS SOL RFP NLM 98-206/VMS POC Valerie M. Syed, Contract Specialist, (301) 496-6546 It is the intent of the National Library of Medicine (NLM) to negotiate on a sole source basis with the University of Washington under authority 41 U.S.C.253(c)(1) and FAR 6.302-1 for "Enhanced Anatomical Knowledge Sources for UMLS." The Contractor will be required to add anatomical knowledge to the Unified Medical Language System (UMLS). NLM's UMLS aids the development of systems that help professionals and researchers retrieve and integrate electronic biomedical information from a variety of sources and to make it easy for users to link disparate information systems, including computer-based patient records, bibliographic databases, factual databases, and expert systems. The UMLS project develops machine-readable "knowledge sources" that can be used by a wide variety of applications programs to overcome retrieval problems caused by differences in terminology and the scattering of relevant information across many databases. The University of Washington shall deliver all information in machine-readableform, in a format appropriate for the integration in the UMLS. The focus of this procurement is a fully instantiated, structured, anatomical knowledge source referring to entities in the limbs, back, neck, and head (excluding the brain). The knowledge source will be both integrated into the Metathesaurus and represented by a hierarchy of semantic types in the Semantic Network. The UMLS Metathesaurus is a knowledge source developed and distributed by NLM that contains information about biomedical concepts and terms from many controlled vocabularies and classifications used in patient records, administrative health data, bibliographic and full-text databases and expert systems. Dr. Cornelius Rosse, an eminent anatomist at the University of Washington, and his associates have already devised an ontology of canonical, macroscopic anatomy. This model is based on a set of principles which distinguishes their work from other symbolic representations of anatomy in several important respects. Their ontology is based on an anatomical (rather than clinical) viewpoint and models the physical (rather than functional) organization of the body. The notion of "Organ" as the basic organizational unit of macroscopic anatomy naturally supports the articulation of a knowledge base which models the physical entities constituting the body and the relationships which exist among these entities. Nodes in the ontology are differentiated by anatomical attributes explicitly defined with sufficient specificity and consistency to allow coherent representation of a domain as complex as anatomy. On the basis of these principles, Dr. Rosse and his associates have unique experience formulating anatomical knowledge fully compatible with existing UMLS structures. Dr. Rosse and his associates at the University of Washington represent the only source that can provide the necessary deliverables. Any other source would have to duplicate the earlier work of the University of Washington at considerable cost and delay to the Government. NLM anticipates awarding a cost-reimbursement contract with a period of performance of September 30, 1998 through September 30, 1999, with a one (1) year option. All responsible sources may submit a proposal which will be considered by NLM. See Numbered Note 22.***** (0169)

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