Hello,

I would like to add the ability for a small application, mostly
textual, to lookup medical terms and as such was looking for a free or
close to it a medical dictionary in text or database form to plug into
my application.

I know there are some online systems to query and some would be in the
form of a file I download, I prefer the download of the information to
be able to import it.

Know where I should find one?

Am I expecting too much assuming such a dictionary would be available
for free or affordably?

/Lizardnation

---

Request for Question Clarification by pinkfreud-ga on 21 May 2003 16:27 PDT

I'm not sure I understand precisely what you're planning to do with
the medical dictionary, so please forgive me if I'm off base here.
Would any of these meet your needs?

http://www.stedmans.com/

http://www.beiks.com/PocketPC/showprod.asp?ProdID=282

http://www.osl.u-net.com/m557.htm

http://www.pharma-lexicon.com/

http://allserv.rug.ac.be/~rvdstich/eugloss/welcome.html

---

Clarification of Question by lizardnation-ga on 21 May 2003 18:02 PDT

Hello Pinkfreud,

What I need is the data of the dictionary, not a service or software.

If I must use a service to provide a re-branded service myself through
my application, then so be it and I would like to know the cost to do
so.

When I checked the websites you quoted, they in majority showed
products that you would buy with their own front-ends to query the
dictionary through.

I saw one exception, which is the one implemented by Heymans Institute
of Pharmacology.  I'm still looking at it, but don't know if it can be
used for commercial gain?

Thank you, hope I've cleared up a few things, though do ask if you
would like to clarify anything.

/Lizardnation

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Request for Question Clarification by pinkfreud-ga on 21 May 2003 18:18 PDT

I wonder whether the Unified Medical Language System might meet your needs:

http://www.nlm.nih.gov/pubs/factsheets/umls.html

http://www.nlm.nih.gov/research/umls/UMLSDOC.HTML

http://www.nlm.nih.gov/research/umls/META4.HTML#s42

---

Request for Question Clarification by pinkfreud-ga on 21 May 2003 18:28 PDT

Here are a few more possibilities (many thanks to Researcher voila-ga
for her assistance):

http://www.spellex.com/Products/meddic.htm

http://www.healthlink.com.au/welcome.htm

http://www.inductel.com/med.html

http://www.us.elsevierhealth.com/searchresults.jsp 

(For the last link, enter "medical dictionary", without quotes, in the
search box)

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Clarification of Question by lizardnation-ga on 27 May 2003 05:01 PDT

Hello Pinkfreud,

I'm sorry if I sound a bit off beat, but I would rather clarify on
what I'm looking for till you grasp it and then you'll suggest
suitable responses.

What do you think? :-)

/Lizardnation

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Request for Question Clarification by pinkfreud-ga on 27 May 2003 13:44 PDT

I am kind of clueless, I guess. ;-)

I hope another Researcher will be able to home in on the right kind of
product for your needs. Any further descriptions or examples would be
very helpful.

---

Clarification of Question by lizardnation-ga on 28 May 2003 03:19 PDT

Hello Pinkfreud,

You're not clueless, but I would rather get suggestions and reasons on
why they were chosen and were found to be suitable to cover my needs.

My needs are as follows:

1. I need a dictionary source to enable my application/service to
re-brand and provide those dictionary facilities.
2. Initiate focus is on the medical industry.
3. Locating synonyms is also very important feature.

The above being satisfied with a static dictionary data file found on
the net which is sometimes updated or through a service which provides
the dictionary(s) for commercial use at a charge and keeps it updated.
 Medical terms are not all that evolving in short time periods, so
updates sooner than a year may not prove cost effective or in demand.


I hope the above would cause more questions to be asked if things are
vague to arrive at what is required and to better utilize your
efforts. :-)

/Lizardnation

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Request for Question Clarification by aceresearcher-ga on 28 May 2003 12:19 PDT

Hi again, lizardnation!

Please let me know if I understand your request correctly:

Based on your other questions, you're developing/developed some kind
of software, either a standalone or web-based package. You want a
backend dictionary that can be plugged into your front-end, much like
the Google Search facility ( ://www.google.com/services ).

You want it to be transparent; i.e., it should be seamlessly
integrated and look like like it's just part of your own application.
So there's going to have to be some programming to interface the
dictionary sub-application into your own application.

Am I anywhere in the right ballpark???

ace

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Clarification of Question by lizardnation-ga on 28 May 2003 13:11 PDT

Hello Aceresearcher,

You got it.  To add to that in more clarification, dictionary data
that I can somehow import and develop the module to use would be fine,
free or otherwise.

You're getting there.. I'm watching. :-)

/Lizardnation

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Request for Question Clarification by aceresearcher-ga on 28 May 2003 13:16 PDT

LN,

I've got obligations on a couple of other Answers right now, so I'm
not able to search for you, but I've let the other Researchers know
about your Clarification, and I'm pretty confident that one of them
will be able to fix you right up.

Best wishes,

ace

---

Clarification of Question by lizardnation-ga on 28 May 2003 13:31 PDT

Ace,

Soright.  I'm not in a hurry. :-)

/Lizardnation

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Request for Question Clarification by webadept-ga on 28 May 2003 14:35 PDT

Hi Lizard, 

So just giving you a list of say 10k -900k of medical terms with
definitions and synonyms isn't going to cut it for you. You want this
updated every 18-24 months or so. right? Because I can give you the
seed list rather fast. I don't know off the top of my head how many
are in there, but there is a lot. I'm not at the server it is on, so I
can't check. But it is probably as complete as any other dictionary
out there. It is in a database, so I can put it in any format you
would like.

webadept-ga

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Clarification of Question by lizardnation-ga on 28 May 2003 15:30 PDT

Hello Webadept,

Actually, that's considered as wonderful.  The range 10k to 900k is
huge to judge it by if it's complete or not, I will wait till you look
at it and give me your opinion on it.

Is it free?

Can I use it for commercial benefit?

What's the structure of the data?

Since it's not maintained by anyone, or is it?, by how much would you
say is it going to age in number of terms roughly per year?

The more I understand about it, the more I'll know in which format I
can most suitably have it in and let you know.

These above questions are not supposed to be expanding the scope of
the question, answer the ones you're comfortable to answer, I'm just
curious.

Thank you, a glimpse of light. :-)

/Lizardnation

---

Request for Question Clarification by webadept-ga on 28 May 2003 17:18 PDT

You might just try this. 

http://cancerweb.ncl.ac.uk/omd/linking.html

I'm not really sure of the "usage" of this database I have for
"profit". Someone wrote everything in there, so in some form there is
a copyright with someone. :-) For personal and free web usage, I'm
pretty sure you would have no problems, but.. if you tried a
subscription thing, I'm fairly certain someone's lawyer would be in
touch... :-P

webadept-ga

Hello again lizzardnation,

     Web is generous with free opinions.
     When it comes to compilation of hard
      and often boring facts,
      people usually want to be paid. 
      This makes this a hard question.

 Once  US government used to do public domain directories for  benefit
of public,  but these days we may have to turn to a nascent,
 still enthusiatic union for such freebees. Here seems to be one:

 1)     Multilingual Glossary of technical and popular medical terms
..
commissioned by The EuropeanCommission(DG III) and executed by
Heymans Institute of Pharmacology and Mercator School, Department of
applied
Linguistics.......The contract stipulated that the medical vocabulary
list was to contain 1,400 terms. The final basic English list consists
of 1,830 term

I did not find any copyright restriction  on download and use.   
Details:

    http://allserv.rug.ac.be/~rvdstich/eugloss/welcome.html


 2) This Health Encyclopedia

             http://www.medicalterms.org/dwp/index/medical_encyclopedia.htm

 "  is provided as a public service by the University of Maryland
Medical
System "    according to:
             http://www.medicalterms.org/

     which may be interpreted as being copyrightfree. To be on the
safe side
     one should to describe the use of the data   and
     ask about what acknowledgement they would they  like to have.

 3) Finally, if these both would fail, you may consider a subset of
dmoz.

Dmoz points to several glossaries
  e.g.:
               http://dmoz.org/Health/Education/Patient_Education/Glossaries/
              http://dmoz.org/Reference/Dictionaries/By_Subject/Medicine/

  These may be copyrighted or public domain,
 but dmoz itself, is available for download, subject to  a generous
Open
Licence:
         http://dmoz.org/license.html
 and by necessity contains list of categories and terms.

 The problem here would be  to extract relevant subset.
starting with general categories, such  such as two listed above.
                    

Search Terms

 Medical dictionary glossary
  Open Licence, regulatory, public service,

 Please,
               feel free to ask for clarification if you need  info
               on download and extraction of subsets of sites.

hedgie

I swear by my Stedman Medical Dictionary.  On Stedman's site, it says
"Premiere Productivity and Reference content is available for
licensing! Whether you need a value added service for your website or
a critical medical reference tool for your software, we have the
content you need!
From the simple spellchecker to our more customized electronic medical
references, our Stedman's team will work with you to build the content
your customers need. Take a look at just a sample of licensing
opportunities:
...Stedman's Medical Dictionary, 27th Edition: Available in SGML/XML
format for integration into your web or software suite of products."
However, you need to request a quote, and it could be pricey
http://www.stedmans.com/section.cfm/59

Tehuti,

Note that the Stedmans site was the very first link I suggested, above.

~Pink

I know, Pink. I'm just pointing out that it does offer a licensing
arrangement...  ...although at a price.
Hence the comment rather than an answer.

I swear by GuruNet for it's simplicity. Hover and Alt/Click for
definitions, tons of cool stuff, including Medical Terms.
Unfortunately it's a stand-alone program, but maybe they offer
more...:

GuruNet
http://www.gurunet.com