Ask Your First Question
Read an answer in MARCUS, inspect its citations, and decide whether the evidence is sufficient.
Once your project has indexed sources, you can ask a question in plain language. The best MARCUS questions sound less like broad brainstorming and more like focused clinical or operational requests: a threshold, a step, a comparison, a criterion, or a workflow decision.
The goal is not just to get "an answer." The goal is to get an answer that you can audit against the underlying sources.
Before You Ask
Pause for a quick pre-check:
- Are the relevant sources already indexed?
- Is the project focused enough that the right documents are likely to be retrieved together?
- Is your question specific enough to produce a useful answer?
- If the answer matters clinically or operationally, are you prepared to read the citations?
If the project is still processing, or if the corpus is visibly mixed, the answer quality may reflect that confusion.
Step By Step
- Open the project chat.
- Type a direct question into the composer.
- Submit the question.
- Watch the streaming status messages while retrieval runs.
- Read the answer slowly enough to compare it with the citations.
- Open the cited source passages if the decision matters.
- Ask a follow-up only after you understand what the first answer did well or poorly.
What A Good First Question Looks Like
Ask about a concrete threshold, workflow, policy, or comparison.
| Good | Why it works | Less helpful |
|---|---|---|
What postoperative fever threshold after POD2 requires escalation? | Asks for a threshold and timing | Tell me about fever. |
When should the dressing be changed after an uncomplicated appendectomy? | Asks for a clear action tied to a defined scenario | What do these documents say? |
What is the call-escalation path for overnight resident coverage issues? | Names an operational workflow and expected answer shape | Help me understand the schedule. |
Which source gives the most conservative discharge criteria? | Requests a comparison and interpretation | Summarize everything about discharge. |
Good Question Patterns You Can Reuse
These templates work well in many projects:
What threshold does the protocol give for...When should...Under what conditions should...How do the uploaded sources differ on...Which document addresses...What steps are recommended when...What are the discharge criteria for...What requires escalation according to our protocol?
How To Read The Streaming Status Messages
During streaming, MARCUS may show messages describing what it is doing. These messages are useful because they tell you whether the system is:
- Interpreting your question
- Searching the project corpus
- Finding evidence
- Ranking passages
- Preparing citations
- Writing the final answer
If the messages mention a topic that matches your question, that is a good sign that the system is searching in the right direction. If the answer later looks weak, the problem may be limited evidence rather than a completely wrong query interpretation.
How To Read The Answer
Focus on four things in this order:
- The main answer text
- The cited sources
- The coverage or confidence cue shown in chat
- The follow-up suggestions, if present
This order matters because a beautifully written answer is still weak if the cited evidence is thin, narrow, or inappropriate.
What Citations Mean
A citation links the answer back to one or more retrieved passages. In MARCUS, citations are the audit trail.
- A cited answer is grounded in retrieved source text.
- A citation is not a guarantee that the answer is complete.
- A citation does not automatically mean the highest-authority source was used.
- A citation should lead you to the exact passage that supports the statement.
For high-stakes decisions, you should assume the citation is the beginning of verification, not the end of it.
What The Coverage Indicator Means
Coverage signals help you judge whether the project likely contained enough evidence for the question you asked.
- Higher coverage usually means MARCUS found multiple relevant passages or sources.
- Lower coverage can mean the corpus is thin, the question is narrow, or the match quality is weak.
- Low coverage does not necessarily mean the answer is wrong. It means you should be cautious about completeness.
When coverage is low, good next steps include:
- Make the question more specific
- Upload a missing source
- Split the project if the corpus is mixed
- Open the cited source directly and continue manually
When Not To Trust The First Answer Yet
Slow down if any of the following are true:
- The answer sounds broad or generic compared with your question
- The citations come from only one narrow source
- The cited source is low-authority for the decision you care about
- The answer makes a strong claim but the cited passage feels only loosely related
- Coverage is low
- You expected a local protocol but got a general reference instead
None of these automatically means the answer is useless. They do mean you should move from "quick read" mode into "careful verification" mode.
Good Follow-Up Questions
Follow up when you need:
- A threshold tied to a subgroup
- A comparison between two documents
- A more conservative interpretation
- The exact cited text
- Clarification on whether the answer is local policy or general background
Examples:
Does the threshold differ for immunocompromised patients?Which document gives the most conservative escalation rule?Show me the cited source text for the discharge criteria.Is this coming from local protocol or an external guideline?
A Safe Reading Checklist
Before using an answer in practice, ask:
- Does the answer actually match the question I asked?
- Are the citations relevant to the main claim?
- Are the cited sources authoritative enough for this decision?
- Is the project missing an obvious local source?
- If two sources disagree, do I understand which one should probably control?
If you cannot answer those questions comfortably, do not treat the answer as final.
Common Reasons A First Question Goes Poorly
| What happened | Likely cause | Better next step |
|---|---|---|
| The answer is generic | The question is too broad or the corpus is mixed | Ask a narrower question or clean the project |
| The answer has weak citations | The relevant source may be missing or low-authority | Upload the missing protocol or inspect the cited source quality |
| The answer ignores the new document | The source may not be indexed yet or may not match the question | Check source status and ask a question that clearly targets the new source |
| The answer sounds right but not local | MARCUS may be relying on general guidance | Add or prioritize local policy documents and ask again |
| The answer conflicts with what you expected | The corpus may contain contradictory sources | Compare the sources directly instead of trusting a single synthesis |
One Reliable Habit
For your first several sessions, open the citations every time. This builds intuition quickly: you learn what good grounding looks like, what weak grounding looks like, and how project quality changes retrieval behavior.