HL7-OMG Collaboration Taskforce:Issues and Opportunities

Jeff Sutherland, Ph.D.CTO, PatientKeeper, Inc.

Co-Investigator, OR of the Future, University Maryland Medical CenterCo-Chair, HL7 Orders and Observations Technical Committee

Microsoft Technical Advisory BoardCertified Scrum Master

OMG Healthcare Day, 4 Nov 2004Washington, D.C.

Collaborative Connectivity: Collaborative Connectivity: Patient Patient -- Physician Physician –– Pharmacist Pharmacist –– Hospital Hospital –– MedicAlertMedicAlert –– ExpressScriptsExpressScripts -- ……

Internet

Web Server

DataVoice Data

Voice

Improve ComplianceImprove ComplianceMonitor Progress & OutcomesMonitor Progress & OutcomesEnhance Patient SafetyEnhance Patient SafetyLower costLower cost

I have a questionabout my medication?

TelephoneNetwork

Physician’sPhysician’sOfficeOffice

Pharmacy Call CenterPharmacy Call Center

Do you mean the new asthma medication?

Whiteboard

EHR Standard

HL7 EHR TC– Functional specification passed vote– Working on profiles for different healthcare organizations

Eventually will have core message design by HL7 Orders and Observations Technical Committee joint with Patient Care Technical CommitteeGoal – a referral transaction can be entire patient record or any subsetEarly adoption by UK, Japan, and other countries –need it now

HL7 Version 3Model Driven ArchitectureEntire Healthcare DomainANSI and International StandardFocus on vocabulary and contentFocus on UML complianceNeeds implementation testing, enhancement, services capability

OMG/HL7 Strategic CollaborationOMG and HL7 will work together on electronic healthcare standards, including electronic drug prescribing, and patient record interoperability infrastructure.A new HL7-OMG collaboration taskforce will leverage the Unified Modeling Language™ (UML™) along with the OMG’s Model Driven Architecture® (MDA®) in order to support interoperability in healthcare.OMG will rely on HL7’s Reference Information Model (RIM) and HL7’s Development Framework (HDF) for OMG'sservice standards. HL7 already incorporates OMG's UML expertise to implement their RIM and its associated methodologies (HDF) to develop standard information models for healthcare and related domains including administrative, financial and research areas.

OMG/HL7 Added ValueHL7 focused on UML compliant messaging between systems– Needs UML compliance to become ISO standard– OMG/HL7 Joint Committee facilitates UML compliance

OMG focused on Model Driven Architecture that is service oriented– How are HL7 messages used to provide value added services?

HL7 EMR standard is currently a list of functional requirements (services that need to be supported)

• Profiles are being defined for different segments of healthcare industry• Messages will then be created for profiles• How will services be supported?

VHA Common ServicesIdentification and Description Document, Version 1.0

Naming Service– A naming service manages a naming system or namespace. It allows for the creation of names, the

binding of names to objects and establishing context for named object bindings.Terminology/Lexical Service

– Provides nationally controlled reference tables and terminology and the ability to manage the organization’s reference vocabulary content and terms over time, (E.g., support code set/term versioning).

Infrastructure Security Services. Capability Locator Service

– A capability is a publicly available function addressing a specific, well-defined responsibility. Assign Person Identifier and Retrieve Person Demographic Information are examples of capabilities.

Delivery Service– Provides for managed transmission of data to other systems (e.g., guaranteed transport,

publication/subscription lists and list management). Information Locator ServicePerson ServiceContent Access ServiceContext Management

– The Context Management Service provides the ability to “link” across applications allowing the registered components to “tune” to the same subject context.

Workflow Management Service (OMG Workflow Management Facility Specification, v.1.2)Clinical Order Entry/Management ServiceResource Management Service

– The Resource Management Service has responsibility to maintain and manage resource items. These resources may be physical plant, human capital, or software/systems (e.g., emergency room, dialysis machine, care practitioner staff, etc.)

Patient Scheduling ServiceEtc.

HL7 EHR Services ProjectKen Rubin

To be charted in January 2005.Use early 2005 to come to terms with identifying the two or three lead candidate areas for a standard. OMG can/should significantly influence this selection. My personal view (Ken Rubin) is that a refresh of PIDS and HILS are among the low hanging fruit.Begin to split activities between the two groups, with HL7 taking the functional lead and OMG the technical, using joint meetings to reconcile.I really believe that OMG can use its process to do much of the heavy-lifting, and then bring interim work to the HL7 community for validation. So long as HL7 can declare success in the functional space, I don't see conflict between the two groups (presuming that I can be successful at driving MDA concepts home in HL7, with them owning CIM and PIM).

Challenges

Run OMG efforts in parallel, decoupled, yet coordinated with HL7Driving MDA concepts into HL7Enlarging HL7 focus from message structure to include Service Oriented Architecture concepts

Opportunities

HL7 has over 35 countries with international affiliatesHL7 Version 3 standardization is happening quickly in affiliate countriesHL7 standards are ANSI standards, moving to ISO standards. ISO requires UML compliance.OMG/HL7 can jointly drive the global standard for interoperable healthcare systems.

Thank You