Modelling and extraction of variability in free-text medication prescriptions from an anonymised primary care electronic medical record research database.

Abstract

Free-text medication prescriptions contain detailed instruction information that is key when preparing drug data for analysis. The objective of this study was to develop a novel model and automated text-mining method to extract detailed structured medication information from free-text prescriptions and explore their variability (e.g. optional dosages) in primary care research databases.