On April 6, Chip Means from Healthcare IT News Europe announced that International healthcare IT standards groups sign agreement, which was done on April 5 at HIMSS.
IHTSDO and HL7 cooperating is a very important move into the good direction, in my opinion. Interoperability is one of the leading issues in how we can and must manage the data flow that will become such an important part of the transformation of healthcare.
What went a bit unnoticed was that only days earlier, another initiative was taken:
On April 1, 2009, the owners of three standards that contain laboratory test terminology – the Logical Observation Identifiers, Names, Codes (LOINC), Nomenclature, Properties and Units (NPU), and the Systematized Nomenclature of Medicine – Clinical Terms (SNOMED CT) – began an operational Trial of prospective divisions of labor in the generation of laboratory test terminology content. This Trial will provide practical experience and important information on opportunities to decrease duplication of effort in the development of laboratory test terminology and to ensure that SNOMED CT works effectively in combination with either LOINC or NPU.
LOINC, NPU and SNOMED CT-Trial of Cooperative Terminology Development, IHTSDO, 1 April 2009
(BTW, the Dutch health IT organisation NICTIZ published the assumed agreement text)
These are very important steps that can help solve problems that have been discussed on this blog in recent time, like connecting regions and countries, linking EHRs with relevant information, semantic and ontological issues. It also puts the post-HIMSS question that has come up in a number of Dutch hospitals, whether to build their own system into another perspective. Reinventing the wheel should not be the way to go and might be a big hindrance in creating interoperability.
Hopefully the above mentioned agreements will facilitate the implementation of these standards into EHRs.
Still remains the issue of billing standards, as we have seen recently. However, we will have to reconsider our perception of the ICD standards. Were they “conceived” to be billing standards?
The ICD is the international standard diagnostic classification for all general epidemiological, many health management purposes and clinical use. These include the analysis of the general health situation of population groups and monitoring of the incidence and prevalence of diseases and other health problems in relation to other variables such as the characteristics and circumstances of the individuals affected, reimbursement, resource allocation, quality and guidelines.
International Classification of Diseases (ICD), WHO
The WHO offers an overview of the history of ICD.
I think we urgently need to start considering bringing all these standards together and use them to create one strong but flexible foundation to support the rapid developing paradigm shifts in healthcare .
Lodewijk Bos
