Make it yours - customizing extraction forms in Laser AI

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In Laser AI, you will find a wide range of customisable extraction templates covering various topics, so you won't need to create a new form from scratch. However, we are aware that, although our standard forms are designed to cover as many concepts as possible, they may not always meet your needs. That is why we have prepared a short guide on the most common changes that can be implemented to the form.

Please note that this is only a basic explanation of the most frequently asked questions. A full description of how to build a data extraction form is available in a separate article in the Knowledge Base.

Adding new text field - for existing section/subsection

To add a new Text field (e.g. Study type) to a section, select the section, click Add field, and choose Text field. You can add multiple text fields to the same section.

Then, in the Settings panel (middle panel), define the field name, adjust its order within the section, and specify whether the field is required and/or designated as a key field. You may also add a field description to improve clarity for reviewers and support accurate, high-quality data extraction.

Detailed description: link

Adding field description

To add a field description to an existing field to improve clarity for reviewers and support accurate data extraction, select the relevant data extraction field and enter the description in the designated "Field description" area.

Field descriptions are primarily intended to support Researchers during the data extraction process, as they provide guidance and suggestions on how specific fields should be extracted.

Adding vocabulary fields

To add a Vocabulary field, first select a section. Then click Add field, and choose Vocabulary field. Next, select a vocabulary from your organization’s controlled vocabularies, MeSH, or create a temporary set by entering a term and pressing Enter.

Vocabularies are hierarchical and can contain multiple levels. You may select all or only specific levels and terms, depending on your project needs. To create a field from a chosen level, click Create field.

For multi-level vocabularies, provide field names for both parent and child levels. The system will automatically create the related data extraction fields.

Detailed description: link

Changing the list of vocabulary terms

To modify the list of terms in an existing dictionary, you can use one of the following options:

- To extend the dictionary with terms from your organization’s vocabulary, open the Vocabulary tab, click Show terms, and select the additional terms to include.

- To add project-specific terms, enter them manually in Additional terms. Note that these terms are available only within the current project and are not added to the organization-wide vocab. If you want to add brand new terms to the organization vocabulary, you have to do it in the 'Vocabularies' tab separately.

Adding or changing models for the text or vocabulary fields

For both Text and Vocabulary fields, you can enable or modify model suggestions. To do so, open the relevant field and select Advanced settings, then choose a model from the list or update the existing selection.

If a model is changed during an active extraction, the new suggestions will apply only to records that have not yet been distributed. Records that are already distributed will continue to display the previous model suggestions.

Changing text field to vocabulary field / vocabulary field to text field

To change a field type, you must recreate the field.

If you want to convert a Text field to a Vocabulary field, delete the existing text field and then add a new vocabulary field in the same section. Similarly, to change a Vocabulary field to a Text field, delete the vocabulary field and create a new text field in its place.

Adding, removing or changing the order of section

To add a new section, open the target tab and click 'Add section'. You can then choose one of the following options:

Import from templates – import one or more sections from an existing template by selecting the template and choosing the sections to include.

Create empty section – create a blank section and enter its name in the middle panel.

After creation or import, you can reorder sections within a tab using the Move up and Move down arrows, or move a section to a different tab by selecting the destination tab in the middle panel. To remove particular section, please click the 'Remove' button in the middle section.

To remove particular section, click on selected section and choose red 'Remove' button. However, before you remove the section, make sure that it is not being used elsewhere in the form. For example, 'Study arm' section that belongs to the 'Population' tab, can be chosen in the 'Efficacy Outcome' section for per-arm comparison data. If you choose this tab, each per-arm outcome will be extracted the same number of times as the number of arms extracted in the 'Study arm' section. Therefore, if you remove 'Study arm' section, per-arm data in the 'Efficacy Outcome' section can't be extracted.

Detailed description: link

If you unintentionally remove a field or section, you can undo the action by clicking the 'Undo' button in the notification bar.