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Integration of Computerized Medical Records—Health Level Seven (HL7) and Integrating the Healthcare Enterprises (IHE)
(http://www.hl7.org/about/), (http://www.ihe.net/about/index.cfm)
Efforts to develop healthcare standards throughout the world for medical records are currently underway for particular healthcare domains including pharmacy, medical devices, imaging and insurance (claims processing) transactions. Many Standards Developing Organizations (SDOs) produce standards (sometimes called specifications or protocols). There is now an increasing necessity for integration between such organizations. Health Level Seven (HL7) is one of several American National Standards Institute (ANSI)-accredited SDOs operating in the healthcare arena, and is the only organization that focuses on the interface requirements of the entire health care system, while others focus their efforts on the requirements of a particular department. The mission of HL7 is to provide standards for the exchange, management and integration of data that support clinical patient care and the management, delivery and evaluation of healthcare services. Specifically, to create flexible, cost effective approaches, standards, guidelines, methodologies, and related services for interoperability between healthcare information systems.
"Level Seven" refers to the highest level of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) communications model for Open Systems Interconnection (OSI)—the application level. The application level addresses definition of the data to be exchanged, the timing of the interchange, and the communication of certain errors to the application. The seventh level supports such functions as security checks, participant identification, availability checks, exchange mechanism negotiations and, most importantly, data exchange structuring. Moreover, on an ongoing basis, HL7 develops a set of protocols on the fastest possible track that is both responsive and responsible to its members. The group addresses the unique requirements of already installed hospital and departmental systems, some of which use mature technologies.
Integrating the Healthcare Enterprises (IHE) is an initiative by healthcare professionals and industry to improve the way computer systems involved in healthcare share information. IHE promotes the coordinated use of established standards such as DICOM and HL7 to address specific clinical needs in support of optimal patient care. Systems developed in accordance with IHE communicate with one another better, are easier to implement, and enable care providers to use information more effectively. Physicians, medical specialists, nurses, administrators and other care providers envision a day when vital information can be passed seamlessly from one system to another within and across departments and made readily available at the point of care by IHE. IHE is designed to make their vision a reality by improving the state of systems integration and removing barriers to optimal patient care.
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