Vascular Surgery Terminology in Spanish: Origin, Availability, and Comprehensibility

Area of Science:

• Vascular Surgery
• Medical Terminology
• Health Informatics

Background:

• Growing demand for specialized vascular information among non-specialists and patients.
• Need to assess the accessibility and clarity of existing medical term definitions.
• Focus on vascular pathologies requires clear communication channels.

Purpose of the Study:

• To identify the availability of vascular terms in major Spanish-language online resources.
• To analyze the etymological origins of these terms.
• To evaluate the readability and comprehensibility of their definitions.

Main Methods:

• Analysis of 150 Spanish vascular surgery terms across five sources: DTM, DLE, Wikipedia, GFEC, and DPTM.
• Selection of 20 terms common to all sources for in-depth linguistic analysis.
• Readability and comprehensibility assessed using automated tools and expert evaluation (linguists, ChatGPT).

Main Results:

• DPTM, DTM, and Wikipedia were the most comprehensive sources for vascular terms.
• Most terms originated from Greek and Latin roots.
• Medical dictionaries exhibited lower readability and comprehensibility compared to Wikipedia, DLE, and GFEC.

Conclusions:

• Existing medical resources often lack accessible and understandable definitions for vascular terms.
• There is a clear need for improved information resources for both healthcare providers and patients.
• Proposal to create a dedicated glossary on the Spanish Society of Angiology and Vascular Surgery website.