Dax Marek Westerman, MS
More Information
Before joining VUMC, Dax Westerman worked for over a decade as an enterprise-level software architect, developer, data analyst, and consultant with a focus on 27/4 high-availability web-based applications with experience in the domains of health care communication, finance, disaster recovery/business continuity, and on-line gaming.
Dax joined the Center in 2011 to pursue a career within biomedical informatics, working within Population Health Informatics and under HSR&D within the VA in the areas of NLP, machine learning, data visualization, clinical dashboards, clinical decision support and data analytics. As of February 2022, Dax was appointed director over the Natural Language Processing Support Services Core, a group with the mission to support development of methods and services in support of NLP research.
Research Information
Al-Garadi M, LeNoue-Newton M, Matheny ME, McPheeters M, Whitaker JM, Deere JA, et al. Automated extraction of mortality information from publicly available sources using large language models: Development and evaluation study. J Med Internet Res [Internet]. 2025 Aug 18 [cited 2025 Nov 5];27(v27i3e71113):e71113. Available from: http://dx.doi.org/10.2196/71113
Al-Garadi M, Desai RJ, Ngan K, LeNoue-Newton M, Reeves RM, Park D, et al. Enhancing cause of death prediction: Development and validation of ML models using multimodal data across multiple healthcare sites [Internet]. medRxiv. 2025. p. 2025.06. 24.25330213. Available from: https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.06.24.25330213.abstract
Matheny ME, Carpenter-Song E, Ricket IM, Solomon RJ, Stabler ME, Davis SE, et al. Sustained improvements after intervention to prevent contrast-associated acute kidney injury: A randomized controlled trial. J Am Heart Assoc [Internet]. 2025 May 20;14(10):e038920. Available from: http://dx.doi.org/10.1161/jaha.124.038920
Al-Garadi M, Davis SE, Matheny ME, Westerman D, Conger AK, Richmond BW, et al. Scalable identification of clinically relevant COPD documents: A lightweight NLP model for large-scale EHR datasets [Internet]. medRxiv. 2025. p. 2025.04. 22.25326240. Available from: https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.04.22.25326240.abstract
Al-Garad M, Reeves RM, Desai RJ, LeNoue-Newton M, Park D, Wang SV, et al. Predicting Causes of Death from Structured Electronic Health Records Using Machine Learning. 2024 Nov 1;33:71–2. Available from: https://scholar.google.com/citations?view_op=view_citation&hl=en&citation_for_view=7x-lrW4AAAAJ:3fE2CSJIrl8C
Ward M, Westerman D, Reeves R, Wrenn J. Automated methods and systems for retrieving information from scanned documents. 2023 Nov 30; Available from: https://scholar.google.com/citations?view_op=view_citation&hl=en&citation_for_view=7x-lrW4AAAAJ:0EnyYjriUFMC
Matheny M, Solomon RJ, Davis SE, Cox KC, Stabler M, Westerman D, et al. IMPROVE AKI: Sustainability of team-based coaching interventions to improve AKI in a cluster-randomized trial. J Am Soc Nephrol [Internet]. 2023 Nov 1;34(11S):59–59. Available from: http://dx.doi.org/10.1681/asn.20233411s159b
Al-Garadi MA, Matheny ME, Desai RJ, Khan MS, Wang SV, Maro JC, et al. NLP Detection of Mortality Information from Publicly Available Data Using Deep Learning Modeling. 2023 Oct 1;32:425–6. Available from: https://www.sentinelinitiative.org/sites/default/files/documents/NLP_Detection_of_Mortality_Information_from_Publicly_Available_Data_Using_Deep_Learning_Modeling_0.pdf
Virani SS, Ramsey DJ, Westerman D, Kuebeler MK, Chen L, Akeroyd JM, et al. Cluster randomized trial of a personalized clinical decision support intervention to improve statin prescribing in patients with atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease. Circulation [Internet]. 2023 May 2;147(18):1411–3. Available from: http://dx.doi.org/10.1161/circulationaha.123.064226
Davis SE, Ssemaganda H, Koola JD, Mao J, Westerman D, Speroff T, et al. Simulating complex patient populations with hierarchical learning effects to support methods development for post-market surveillance. BMC Med Res Methodol [Internet]. 2023 Apr 11;23(1):89. Available from: http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12874-023-01913-9
Brown JR, Solomon R, Stabler ME, Davis S, Carpenter-Song E, Zubkoff L, et al. Team-Based Coaching Intervention to Improve Contrast-Associated Acute Kidney Injury: A Cluster-Randomized Trial. Clin J Am Soc Nephrol [Internet]. 2023 Mar 1;18(3):315–26. Available from: http://dx.doi.org/10.2215/CJN.0000000000000067
Toh S, Carrell D, Smith JC, Park D, Whitaker J, McLemore MF, et al. Data-driven approaches to improve phenotype sensitivity using EHR data. 2022 Sept 1;31:549–549. Available from: https://scholar.google.com/citations?view_op=view_citation&hl=en&citation_for_view=7x-lrW4AAAAJ:u-x6o8ySG0sC
Davis SE, Brown JR, Dorn C, Westerman D, Solomon RJ, Matheny ME. Maintaining a National Acute Kidney Injury Risk Prediction Model to Support Local Quality Benchmarking. Circ Cardiovasc Qual Outcomes [Internet]. 2022 Aug;15(8):e008635. Available from: http://dx.doi.org/10.1161/CIRCOUTCOMES.121.008635
Friberg JE, Qazi AH, Boyle B, Franciscus C, Vaughan-Sarrazin M, Westerman D, et al. Ankle- and toe-brachial index for peripheral artery disease identification: Unlocking clinical data through novel methods. Circ Cardiovasc Interv [Internet]. 2022 Feb 18;15(3):e011092. Available from: http://dx.doi.org/10.1161/circinterventions.121.011092
Wrenn J, Lin S, Han J, Reeves R, Westerman D, Matheny M, et al. AUTO-PILOT: Development and validation of a tool to extract structured data in interfacility transfer paperwork. Conference of American Medical Informatics Association [Internet]. 2022; Available from: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=EH6I-hcAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=sra
Mao J, Davis SE, Ssemaganda H, Westerman DM. A framework for detecting medical device safety signals confounded by learning effects using machine learning. AMIA. 2022
Toh S, Carrell D, Smith JC, Park D, Whitaker J, McLemore MF, et al. Data-driven approaches to improve phenotype sensitivity using EHR data. In: Pharmacoepidemiology And Drug Safety [Internet]. WILEY 111 RIVER ST, HOBOKEN 07030-5774, NJ USA; 2022. p. 549–549. Available from: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=DSJXDUAAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=sra
Govindarajulu U, Koola J, Mao J, Westerman DM. Disentangling and characterizing device safety signals and learning effects. AMIA. 2022; Brown JR, Solomon RJ, Stabler M, Davis SE, Cox KC, Westerman D, et al. IMPROVE AKI: A cluster-randomized trial of team-based coaching interventions to improve AKI. J Am Soc Nephrol [Internet]. 2021 Oct 1;32(10S):3–3. Available from: http://dx.doi.org/10.1681/ASN.20213210S13a
Friberg JE, Qazi AH, Boyle B, Franciscus C, Vaughan-Sarrazin M, Westerman DM, et al. Ankle and Toe Brachial Index Extraction from Clinical Reports For Peripheral Artery Disease Identification: Unlocking Clinical Data through Novel Methods. medRxiv [Internet]. 2021; Available from: https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.05.08.21256421v1.abstract
Wrenn JO, Westerman D, Reeves RM, Ward MJ. 221^EMF Development and Validation of a Text Rendering and Data Retrieval System for Extracting Clinical Information from Paper Medical Records. Ann Emerg Med [Internet]. 2020 Oct 1;76(4):S86. Available from: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.annemergmed.2020.09.234
Garvin JH, Ducom J, Matheny M, Miller A, Westerman D, Reale C, et al. Descriptive Usability Study of CirrODS: Clinical Decision and Workflow Support Tool for Management of Patients With Cirrhosis. JMIR Med Inform [Internet]. 2019 July 3;7(3):e13627. Available from: http://dx.doi.org/10.2196/13627
Westerman DM, FitzHenry F, Matheny ME, LeNoue-Newton ML, Mosse CA, Maurer I, et al. Integrating Cancer Genomic Data into Decision Support at the VA: Hematologic Oncology as a Use Case. In: AMIA. 2018. Ho SB, Ducom J, Miller A, Garvin JH, Koola JD, Beebe R, et al. Workflow-guided development of a clinical decision support tool for patients with advanced liver disease. In: AMIA. 2016.
Matheny ME, Westerman DM, Pearlman L, Gieringer J, Jiang X, Farcas C, et al. An Integrated Privacy Preserving Collaborative Analytics Platform: The PCORnet pSCANNER-PopMedNet TM Software Suite. In: AMIA. 2016. Ohno-Machado L, Agha Z, Bell DS, Dahm L, Day ME, Doctor JN, et al. pSCANNER: patient-centered Scalable National Network for Effectiveness Research. J Am Med Inform Assoc [Internet]. 2014 July;21(4):621–6. Available from: http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/amiajnl-2014-002751
Westerman D, Matheny M, Callaway-Lane C, Hathaway J, Dittus R, Speroff T. A Real-Time Electronic Dashboard For Geriatric Care: An On-Line Informatics Tool Facilitating Distance Collaboration Of Geriatric Scholar Quality Improvement. 2013 Nov 1;53:609–609. Available from: https://scholar.google.com/citations?view_op=view_citation&hl=en&citati…;
M. W. Berry and D. M. Westerman. Cluster Form Analysis Techniques for Diabetic Retinopathy. In: M.A. Horn, G. Simonett, and G. Webb, editor. Mathematical Models in Medical and Health Sciences. Vanderbilt University; Marth 30 1998. p. 35–50. ( Innovations in Applied Mathematics).
Westerman DM. The design and application of ICAT : Interactive Cluster Analysis Toolkit [Internet]. University of Tennessee, Knoxville; 1998 [cited 2025 Oct 13]. Available from: https://trace.tennessee.edu/utk_gradthes/10429