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March 21, 2023
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Review

Semantic Ontologies for Complex Healthcare Structures: A Scoping Review

Publicated to: IEEE Access. 11 19228-19246 - 2023-01-01 11(), DOI: 10.1109/access.2023.3248969

Authors:

Luschi, A; Petraccone, C; Fico, G; Pecchia, L; Iadanza, E
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Affiliations

Faculty of Science, Engineering and Medicine , Università Campus Bio-Medico di Roma - Author
Univ Campus Biomed Roma, Dept Engn, I-00128 Rome, Italy - Author
Univ Florence, Dept Informat Engn, I-50139 Florence, Italy - Author
Univ Politecn Madrid, Life Supporting Technol, Madrid 28040, Spain - Author
Univ Siena, Dept Med Biotechnol, I-53100 Siena, Italy - Author
Univ Warwick, Sch Engn, Coventry CV4 7AL, England - Author
Universidad Politécnica de Madrid - Author
Università degli Studi di Firenze - Author
Università Degli Studi di Siena - Author
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Abstract

The healthcare environment is made up of highly complicated interactions between many technologies, activities, and people. Ensuring a solid communication between them is vital to ease the healthcare management. Semantic ontologies are knowledge representation tools that implement abstractions to fully describe a given topic in terms of subjects and relations. This scoping review aims to identify and analyse available ontologies which can depict all the available use-cases that describe the hospital environment in relation to the European project ODIN and its future expansion. The review has been conducted on the Scopus database on January 13th, 2023 using the PRISMA extensions for scoping reviews. Two reviewers screened 3,225 documents emerged from the database search. Further filtering led to a final set of 32 articles to be analysed for the results. A set of 34 ontologies extracted by the identified articles has been analysed and discussed as well. The results of this study will lead to the implementation of a common integrated ontology which could hold information about healthcare entities as well as their semantic relationships, strengthen data exchange and interconnections among people, devices and applications in an expanded scenario which include Internet of Things, robots and Artificial Intelligence.
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Keywords

artificial intelligencehealthcare structureshospitalsinternetinternet of medical thingsiotlogisticsmedical devicesmedical roboticsmedical servicesontologiesroboticssemanticsthingsArtificial intelligenceHealthcare structuresIotMedical devicesNavigationOntologiesRoboticsSemantics

Quality index

Bibliometric impact. Analysis of the contribution and dissemination channel

The work has been published in the journal IEEE Access due to its progression and the good impact it has achieved in recent years, according to the agency Scopus (SJR), it has become a reference in its field. In the year of publication of the work, 2023, it was in position , thus managing to position itself as a Q1 (Primer Cuartil), in the category Engineering (Miscellaneous).

From a relative perspective, and based on the normalized impact indicator calculated from World Citations provided by WoS (ESI, Clarivate), it yields a value for the citation normalization relative to the expected citation rate of: 3.19. This indicates that, compared to works in the same discipline and in the same year of publication, it ranks as a work cited above average. (source consulted: ESI Nov 13, 2025)

This information is reinforced by other indicators of the same type, which, although dynamic over time and dependent on the set of average global citations at the time of their calculation, consistently position the work at some point among the top 50% most cited in its field:

  • Weighted Average of Normalized Impact by the Scopus agency: 3.79 (source consulted: FECYT Mar 2025)

Specifically, and according to different indexing agencies, this work has accumulated citations as of 2026-04-24, the following number of citations:

  • WoS: 16
  • Scopus: 22
  • Google Scholar: 10
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Impact and social visibility

From the perspective of influence or social adoption, and based on metrics associated with mentions and interactions provided by agencies specializing in calculating the so-called "Alternative or Social Metrics," we can highlight as of 2026-04-24:

  • The use of this contribution in bookmarks, code forks, additions to favorite lists for recurrent reading, as well as general views, indicates that someone is using the publication as a basis for their current work. This may be a notable indicator of future more formal and academic citations. This claim is supported by the result of the "Capture" indicator, which yields a total of: 62 (PlumX).

With a more dissemination-oriented intent and targeting more general audiences, we can observe other more global scores such as:

    It is essential to present evidence supporting full alignment with institutional principles and guidelines on Open Science and the Conservation and Dissemination of Intellectual Heritage. A clear example of this is:

    • The work has been submitted to a journal whose editorial policy allows open Open Access publication.
    • Assignment of a Handle/URN as an identifier within the deposit in the Institutional Repository: https://oa.upm.es/94523/

    As a result of the publication of the work in the institutional repository, statistical usage data has been obtained that reflects its impact. In terms of dissemination, we can state that, as of

    • Views: 21
    • Downloads: 10
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    Leadership analysis of institutional authors

    This work has been carried out with international collaboration, specifically with researchers from: Italy; United Kingdom.

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    Project objectives

    La aportación persigue los siguientes objetivos: identificar y analizar ontologías disponibles que representen casos de uso del entorno hospitalario relacionados con el proyecto europeo ODIN; aplicar la metodología PRISMA para realizar una revisión sistemática en la base de datos Scopus con fecha 13 de enero de 2023; seleccionar y evaluar un conjunto final de 32 artículos y 34 ontologías extraídas para su análisis detallado; caracterizar las relaciones semánticas entre entidades sanitarias para facilitar la gestión hospitalaria; y sentar las bases para la implementación de una ontología integrada común que fortalezca el intercambio de datos y la interconexión entre personas, dispositivos y aplicaciones en escenarios ampliados que incluyan Internet de las Cosas, robots e inteligencia artificial.
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    Most relevant results

    Este estudio presenta un análisis exhaustivo de ontologías semánticas aplicadas al entorno hospitalario. Los resultados más relevantes incluyen: la revisión inicial de 3,225 documentos en la base Scopus, filtrados a 32 artículos para análisis detallado; la identificación y análisis de 34 ontologías extraídas de dichos artículos; la aplicación del protocolo PRISMA para revisiones de alcance, realizada el 13 de enero de 2023; la relación de estas ontologías con el proyecto europeo ODIN y su futura expansión; y la propuesta de una ontología integrada común para mejorar el intercambio de datos y las interacciones entre personas, dispositivos y aplicaciones, incluyendo tecnologías como Internet de las Cosas, robots e Inteligencia Artificial.
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