Cited by 127Nursing Diagnosis and DocumentationElectronic Health Records SystemsMachine Learning in Healthcare

Automatic generation of natural language nursing shift summaries in neonatal intensive care: BT-Nurse

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Hunter, James, Freer, Yvonne, Gatt, Albert, Reiter, Ehud, Sripada, Somayajulu, Sykes, Cindy·2012·Artificial Intelligence in Medicine

Abstract

Introduction Our objective was to determine whether and how a computer system could automatically generate helpful natural language nursing shift summaries solely from an electronic patient record system, in a neonatal intensive care unit (NICU).Methods A system was developed which automatically generates partial NICU shift summaries (for the respiratory and cardiovascular systems), using data-to-text technology. It was evaluated for 2 months in the NICU at the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh, under supervision.Results In an on-ward evaluation, a substantial majority of the summaries was found by outgoing and incoming nurses to be understandable (90%), and a majority was found to be accurate (70%), and helpful (59%). The evaluation also served to identify some outstanding issues, especially with regard to extra content the nurses wanted to see in the computer-generated summaries.Conclusions It is technically possible automatically to generate limited natural language NICU shift summaries from an electronic patient record. However, it proved difficult to handle electronic data that was intended primarily for display to the medical staff, and considerable engineering effort would be required to create a deployable system from our proof-of-concept software.

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Crossref · 10.1016/j.artmed.2012.09.002

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  • Hunter et al. used natural-language generation to summarize EHR data and generate potential problems and care plans in a dynamic shift-change report in the neonatal ICU context.

    “In the neonatal ICU context, Hunter et al63 used natural-language generation to summarize EHR data and generate potential problems and care plans in a dynamic shift-change report.”

    From Potential uses of AI for perioperative nursing handoffs: a qualitative study (2023) · cites this paper as [63]

    The abstract (p. 1) and system description (p. 2) confirm that BT-Nurse generated natural-language summaries from electronic NICU records for shift handover. The Data Interpretation section (p. 8) says it identified potential problems, but the paper does not say it generated care plans: the care-plan example is from an expert nurse’s summary (p. 2), while BT-Nurse’s summaries were intended to help nurses with care planning (Methodology, p. 12). (LLM, conf=0.89)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured
  • Nurse users largely accepted a prototype system for shift change in the neonatal intensive care unit which focused on summarizing data in natural language and included expert decision rules as a minor component.

    “Nurse users largely accepted a prototype system for shift change in the neonatal intensive care unit which focused on summarizing data in natural language and included expert decision rules as a minor component.63”

    From Potential uses of AI for perioperative nursing handoffs: a qualitative study (2023) · cites this paper as [63]

    The abstract (p. 1) reports that nurses rated most generated summaries understandable, accurate and helpful, supporting a broadly positive reception of the NICU shift-handover prototype. Section 3.2.6 (p. 8) describes medical-knowledge if–then rules used in data interpretation, but the paper does not establish that expert decision rules were a minor component. The evaluation measured nurses’ ratings of partial summaries, not acceptance of a deployable system. (LLM, conf=0.82)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured
  • Hunter and Forbes's work suggests a distinct role for AI prediction from traditional CDS: facilitating problem-based report and assessment during handoffs.

    “Hunter and Forbes's work56,63,64 suggests a distinct role for AI prediction from traditional CDS: facilitating problem-based report and assessment during handoffs.”

    From Potential uses of AI for perioperative nursing handoffs: a qualitative study (2023) · cites this paper as [63]

    The Conclusions (p. 15) say BT-Nurse generates shift summaries that include current status and potential problems, supporting its role in handoff reporting. The paper does not present BT-Nurse as an AI prediction system or establish a distinct predictive role from traditional clinical decision support; its Computerised shift handover section (p. 2) describes the summaries as complementing other handover communication. (LLM, conf=0.85)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured
  • Works [101,102] have demonstrated the possible uses of systems combining classical data mining techniques with natural language generation in both clinical and experimental contexts.

    “Works such as [101,102] have demonstrated the possible uses of such systems in both clinical and experimental contexts.”

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Authors
Hunter, J., Freer, Y., Gatt, A., Reiter, E., Sripada, S., & Sykes, C.
Affiliations
University of Aberdeen (GB)
Venue
Artificial Intelligence in Medicine
Publisher
Elsevier BV
Published
2012-11
Volume
56
Issue
3
Pages
157-172
ISSN
0933-3657 (ISSN-L)
OpenAlex
W2154568233
Cited by
127
References
92
Citations by year
2026: 2 · 2025: 1 · 2024: 6 · 2023: 5 · 2022: 7 · 2021: 3 · 2020: 5 · 2019: 7 · 2018: 53 · 2017: 3 · 2016: 10 · 2015: 10 · 2014: 4 · 2013: 10
FWCI
38.93
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • Artificial Intelligence in Medicine (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • OAR@UM (University of Malta) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
Funders
Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EP/D049520/1, EP/D05057X/1)
Topics
  • Health Sciences › Nursing › Issues, ethics and legal aspects › Nursing Diagnosis and Documentation
  • Health Sciences › Health Professions › Health Information Management › Electronic Health Records Systems
  • Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Artificial Intelligence › Machine Learning in Healthcare
Keywords
text generation, neonatal intensive care, electronic health records, clinical information systems, nursing documentation
MeSH terms
Communication, Humans, Information Systems, Intensive Care Units, Neonatal, Natural Language Processing, Nursing Staff, Hospital, Electronic Health Records, Patient Handoff

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