NHS Digital FHIR Implementation Guide (Retired - 2.1.50)

A version-independent identifier for the Composition. This identifier stays constant as the composition is changed over time.

Similar to ClinicalDocument/setId in CDA. See discussion in resource definition for how these relate.

The workflow/clinical status of this composition. The status is a marker for the clinical standing of the document.

Need to be able to mark interim, amended, or withdrawn compositions or documents.

If a composition is marked as withdrawn, the compositions/documents in the series, or data from the composition or document series, should never be displayed to a user without being clearly marked as untrustworthy. The flag "entered-in-error" is why this element is labeled as a modifier of other elements.

Some reporting work flows require that the original narrative of a final document never be altered; instead, only new narrative can be added. The composition resource has no explicit status for explicitly noting whether this business rule is in effect. This would be handled by an extension if required.

The workflow/clinical status of the composition.

Specifies the particular kind of composition (e.g. History and Physical, Discharge Summary, Progress Note). This usually equates to the purpose of making the composition.

Key metadata element describing the composition, used in searching/filtering.

For Composition type, LOINC is ubiquitous and strongly endorsed by HL7. Most implementation guides will require a specific LOINC code, or use LOINC as an extensible binding.

Type of a composition.

A categorization for the type of the composition - helps for indexing and searching. This may be implied by or derived from the code specified in the Composition Type.

Helps humans to assess whether the composition is of interest when viewing an index of compositions or documents.

This is a metadata field from XDS/MHD.

High-level kind of a clinical document at a macro level.

Describes the clinical encounter or type of care this documentation is associated with.

Provides context for the composition and supports searching.

References SHALL be a reference to an actual FHIR resource, and SHALL be resolveable (allowing for access control, temporary unavailability, etc.). Resolution can be either by retrieval from the URL, or, where applicable by resource type, by treating an absolute reference as a canonical URL and looking it up in a local registry/repository.

The composition editing time, when the composition was last logically changed by the author.

dateTime is used for tracking, organizing versions and searching. Note that this is the time of authoring. When packaged in a document, Bundle.timestamp is the date of packaging.

The Last Modified Date on the composition may be after the date of the document was attested without being changed.

Identifies who is responsible for the information in the composition, not necessarily who typed it in.

Identifies who is responsible for the content.

References SHALL be a reference to an actual FHIR resource, and SHALL be resolveable (allowing for access control, temporary unavailability, etc.). Resolution can be either by retrieval from the URL, or, where applicable by resource type, by treating an absolute reference as a canonical URL and looking it up in a local registry/repository.

Official human-readable label for the composition.

For many compositions, the title is the same as the text or a display name of Composition.type (e.g. a "consultation" or "progress note"). Note that CDA does not make title mandatory, but there are no known cases where it is useful for title to be omitted, so it is mandatory here. Feedback on this requirement is welcome during the trial use period.

The code specifying the level of confidentiality of the Composition.

The exact use of this element, and enforcement and issues related to highly sensitive documents are out of scope for the base specification, and delegated to implementation profiles (see security section). This element is labeled as a modifier because highly confidential documents must not be treated as if they are not.

Codes specifying the level of confidentiality of the composition.

The type of attestation the authenticator offers.

Indicates the level of authority of the attestation.

Note that FHIR strings SHALL NOT exceed 1MB in size

The way in which a person authenticated a composition.

When the composition was attested by the party.

Identifies when the information in the composition was deemed accurate. (Things may have changed since then.).

Who attested the composition in the specified way.

Identifies who has taken on the responsibility for accuracy of the composition content.

References SHALL be a reference to an actual FHIR resource, and SHALL be resolveable (allowing for access control, temporary unavailability, etc.). Resolution can be either by retrieval from the URL, or, where applicable by resource type, by treating an absolute reference as a canonical URL and looking it up in a local registry/repository.

Identifies the organization or group who is responsible for ongoing maintenance of and access to the composition/document information.

Identifies where to go to find the current version, where to report issues, etc.

This is useful when documents are derived from a composition - provides guidance for how to get the latest version of the document. This is optional because this is sometimes not known by the authoring system, and can be inferred by context. However, it is important that this information be known when working with a derived document, so providing a custodian is encouraged.

The type of relationship that this composition has with anther composition or document.

If this document appends another document, then the document cannot be fully understood without also accessing the referenced document.

The type of relationship between documents.

This list of codes represents the main clinical acts, such as a colonoscopy or an appendectomy, being documented. In some cases, the event is inherent in the typeCode, such as a "History and Physical Report" in which the procedure being documented is necessarily a "History and Physical" act.

An event can further specialize the act inherent in the typeCode, such as where it is simply "Procedure Report" and the procedure was a "colonoscopy". If one or more eventCodes are included, they SHALL NOT conflict with the values inherent in the classCode, practiceSettingCode or typeCode, as such a conflict would create an ambiguous situation. This short list of codes is provided to be used as key words for certain types of queries.

This list of codes represents the main clinical acts being documented.

The period of time covered by the documentation. There is no assertion that the documentation is a complete representation for this period, only that it documents events during this time.

A Period specifies a range of time; the context of use will specify whether the entire range applies (e.g. "the patient was an inpatient of the hospital for this time range") or one value from the range applies (e.g. "give to the patient between these two times").

Period is not used for a duration (a measure of elapsed time). See Duration.

The description and/or reference of the event(s) being documented. For example, this could be used to document such a colonoscopy or an appendectomy.

References SHALL be a reference to an actual FHIR resource, and SHALL be resolveable (allowing for access control, temporary unavailability, etc.). Resolution can be either by retrieval from the URL, or, where applicable by resource type, by treating an absolute reference as a canonical URL and looking it up in a local registry/repository.

The label for this particular section. This will be part of the rendered content for the document, and is often used to build a table of contents.

Section headings are often standardized for different types of documents. They give guidance to humans on how the document is organized.

The title identifies the section for a human reader. The title must be consistent with the narrative of the resource that is the target of the section.content reference. Generally, sections SHOULD have titles, but in some documents, it is unnecessary or inappropriate. Typically, this is where a section has subsections that have their own adequately distinguishing title, or documents that only have a single section. Most Implementation Guides will make section title to be a required element.

The version of the code system which was used when choosing this code. Note that a well-maintained code system does not need the version reported, because the meaning of codes is consistent across versions. However this cannot consistently be assured, and when the meaning is not guaranteed to be consistent, the version SHOULD be exchanged.

Where the terminology does not clearly define what string should be used to identify code system versions, the recommendation is to use the date (expressed in FHIR date format) on which that version was officially published as the version date.

Indicates that this coding was chosen by a user directly - e.g. off a pick list of available items (codes or displays).

This has been identified as a clinical safety criterium - that this exact system/code pair was chosen explicitly, rather than inferred by the system based on some rules or language processing.

Amongst a set of alternatives, a directly chosen code is the most appropriate starting point for new translations. There is some ambiguity about what exactly 'directly chosen' implies, and trading partner agreement may be needed to clarify the use of this element and its consequences more completely.

A human language representation of the concept as seen/selected/uttered by the user who entered the data and/or which represents the intended meaning of the user.

The codes from the terminologies do not always capture the correct meaning with all the nuances of the human using them, or sometimes there is no appropriate code at all. In these cases, the text is used to capture the full meaning of the source.

Very often the text is the same as a displayName of one of the codings.

Identifies who is responsible for the information in this section, not necessarily who typed it in.

Identifies who is responsible for the content.

References SHALL be a reference to an actual FHIR resource, and SHALL be resolveable (allowing for access control, temporary unavailability, etc.). Resolution can be either by retrieval from the URL, or, where applicable by resource type, by treating an absolute reference as a canonical URL and looking it up in a local registry/repository.

The actual focus of the section when it is not the subject of the composition, but instead represents something or someone associated with the subject such as (for a patient subject) a spouse, parent, fetus, or donor. If not focus is specified, the focus is assumed to be focus of the parent section, or, for a section in the Composition itself, the subject of the composition. Sections with a focus SHALL only include resources where the logical subject (patient, subject, focus, etc.) matches the section focus, or the resources have no logical subject (few resources).

Typically, sections in a doument are about the subject of the document, whether that is a patient, or group of patients, location, or device, or whatever. For some kind of documents, some sections actually contain data about related entities. Typical examples are a section in a newborn discharge summary concerning the mother, or family history documents, with a section about each family member, though there are many other examples.

How the entry list was prepared - whether it is a working list that is suitable for being maintained on an ongoing basis, or if it represents a snapshot of a list of items from another source, or whether it is a prepared list where items may be marked as added, modified or deleted.

Sections are used in various ways, and it must be known in what way it is safe to use the entries in them.

This element is labeled as a modifier because a change list must not be misunderstood as a complete list.

The processing mode that applies to this section.

Specifies the order applied to the items in the section entries.

Important for presentation and rendering. Lists may be sorted to place more important information first or to group related entries.

Applications SHOULD render ordered lists in the order provided, but MAY allow users to re-order based on their own preferences as well. If there is no order specified, the order is unknown, though there may still be some order.

What order applies to the items in the entry.

A reference to the actual resource from which the narrative in the section is derived.

If there are no entries in the list, an emptyReason SHOULD be provided.

If the section is empty, why the list is empty. An empty section typically has some text explaining the empty reason.

Allows capturing things like "none exist" or "not asked" which can be important for most lists.

The various reasons for an empty section make a significant interpretation to its interpretation. Note that this code is for use when the entire section content has been suppressed, and not for when individual items are omitted - implementers may consider using a text note or a flag on an entry in these cases.

If a section is empty, why it is empty.

A nested sub-section within this section.

Nested sections are primarily used to help human readers navigate to particular portions of the document.

The identification of the code system that defines the meaning of the symbol in the code.

Need to be unambiguous about the source of the definition of the symbol.

The URI may be an OID (urn:oid:...) or a UUID (urn:uuid:...). OIDs and UUIDs SHALL be references to the HL7 OID registry. Otherwise, the URI should come from HL7's list of FHIR defined special URIs or it should reference to some definition that establishes the system clearly and unambiguously.

The version of the code system which was used when choosing this code. Note that a well-maintained code system does not need the version reported, because the meaning of codes is consistent across versions. However this cannot consistently be assured, and when the meaning is not guaranteed to be consistent, the version SHOULD be exchanged.

Where the terminology does not clearly define what string should be used to identify code system versions, the recommendation is to use the date (expressed in FHIR date format) on which that version was officially published as the version date.

Indicates that this coding was chosen by a user directly - e.g. off a pick list of available items (codes or displays).

This has been identified as a clinical safety criterium - that this exact system/code pair was chosen explicitly, rather than inferred by the system based on some rules or language processing.

Amongst a set of alternatives, a directly chosen code is the most appropriate starting point for new translations. There is some ambiguity about what exactly 'directly chosen' implies, and trading partner agreement may be needed to clarify the use of this element and its consequences more completely.

A human language representation of the concept as seen/selected/uttered by the user who entered the data and/or which represents the intended meaning of the user.

The codes from the terminologies do not always capture the correct meaning with all the nuances of the human using them, or sometimes there is no appropriate code at all. In these cases, the text is used to capture the full meaning of the source.

Very often the text is the same as a displayName of one of the codings.

Identifies who is responsible for the information in this section, not necessarily who typed it in.

Identifies who is responsible for the content.

References SHALL be a reference to an actual FHIR resource, and SHALL be resolveable (allowing for access control, temporary unavailability, etc.). Resolution can be either by retrieval from the URL, or, where applicable by resource type, by treating an absolute reference as a canonical URL and looking it up in a local registry/repository.

The actual focus of the section when it is not the subject of the composition, but instead represents something or someone associated with the subject such as (for a patient subject) a spouse, parent, fetus, or donor. If not focus is specified, the focus is assumed to be focus of the parent section, or, for a section in the Composition itself, the subject of the composition. Sections with a focus SHALL only include resources where the logical subject (patient, subject, focus, etc.) matches the section focus, or the resources have no logical subject (few resources).

Typically, sections in a doument are about the subject of the document, whether that is a patient, or group of patients, location, or device, or whatever. For some kind of documents, some sections actually contain data about related entities. Typical examples are a section in a newborn discharge summary concerning the mother, or family history documents, with a section about each family member, though there are many other examples.

A human-readable narrative that contains the attested content of the section, used to represent the content of the resource to a human. The narrative need not encode all the structured data, but is required to contain sufficient detail to make it "clinically safe" for a human to just read the narrative.

Document profiles may define what content should be represented in the narrative to ensure clinical safety.

How the entry list was prepared - whether it is a working list that is suitable for being maintained on an ongoing basis, or if it represents a snapshot of a list of items from another source, or whether it is a prepared list where items may be marked as added, modified or deleted.

Sections are used in various ways, and it must be known in what way it is safe to use the entries in them.

This element is labeled as a modifier because a change list must not be misunderstood as a complete list.

The processing mode that applies to this section.

Specifies the order applied to the items in the section entries.

Important for presentation and rendering. Lists may be sorted to place more important information first or to group related entries.

Applications SHOULD render ordered lists in the order provided, but MAY allow users to re-order based on their own preferences as well. If there is no order specified, the order is unknown, though there may still be some order.

What order applies to the items in the entry.

If the section is empty, why the list is empty. An empty section typically has some text explaining the empty reason.

Allows capturing things like "none exist" or "not asked" which can be important for most lists.

The various reasons for an empty section make a significant interpretation to its interpretation. Note that this code is for use when the entire section content has been suppressed, and not for when individual items are omitted - implementers may consider using a text note or a flag on an entry in these cases.

If a section is empty, why it is empty.

A nested sub-section within this section.

Nested sections are primarily used to help human readers navigate to particular portions of the document.

The identification of the code system that defines the meaning of the symbol in the code.

Need to be unambiguous about the source of the definition of the symbol.

The URI may be an OID (urn:oid:...) or a UUID (urn:uuid:...). OIDs and UUIDs SHALL be references to the HL7 OID registry. Otherwise, the URI should come from HL7's list of FHIR defined special URIs or it should reference to some definition that establishes the system clearly and unambiguously.

The version of the code system which was used when choosing this code. Note that a well-maintained code system does not need the version reported, because the meaning of codes is consistent across versions. However this cannot consistently be assured, and when the meaning is not guaranteed to be consistent, the version SHOULD be exchanged.

Where the terminology does not clearly define what string should be used to identify code system versions, the recommendation is to use the date (expressed in FHIR date format) on which that version was officially published as the version date.

Indicates that this coding was chosen by a user directly - e.g. off a pick list of available items (codes or displays).

This has been identified as a clinical safety criterium - that this exact system/code pair was chosen explicitly, rather than inferred by the system based on some rules or language processing.

Amongst a set of alternatives, a directly chosen code is the most appropriate starting point for new translations. There is some ambiguity about what exactly 'directly chosen' implies, and trading partner agreement may be needed to clarify the use of this element and its consequences more completely.

A human language representation of the concept as seen/selected/uttered by the user who entered the data and/or which represents the intended meaning of the user.

The codes from the terminologies do not always capture the correct meaning with all the nuances of the human using them, or sometimes there is no appropriate code at all. In these cases, the text is used to capture the full meaning of the source.

Very often the text is the same as a displayName of one of the codings.

Identifies who is responsible for the information in this section, not necessarily who typed it in.

Identifies who is responsible for the content.

References SHALL be a reference to an actual FHIR resource, and SHALL be resolveable (allowing for access control, temporary unavailability, etc.). Resolution can be either by retrieval from the URL, or, where applicable by resource type, by treating an absolute reference as a canonical URL and looking it up in a local registry/repository.

The actual focus of the section when it is not the subject of the composition, but instead represents something or someone associated with the subject such as (for a patient subject) a spouse, parent, fetus, or donor. If not focus is specified, the focus is assumed to be focus of the parent section, or, for a section in the Composition itself, the subject of the composition. Sections with a focus SHALL only include resources where the logical subject (patient, subject, focus, etc.) matches the section focus, or the resources have no logical subject (few resources).

Typically, sections in a doument are about the subject of the document, whether that is a patient, or group of patients, location, or device, or whatever. For some kind of documents, some sections actually contain data about related entities. Typical examples are a section in a newborn discharge summary concerning the mother, or family history documents, with a section about each family member, though there are many other examples.

A human-readable narrative that contains the attested content of the section, used to represent the content of the resource to a human. The narrative need not encode all the structured data, but is required to contain sufficient detail to make it "clinically safe" for a human to just read the narrative.

Document profiles may define what content should be represented in the narrative to ensure clinical safety.

How the entry list was prepared - whether it is a working list that is suitable for being maintained on an ongoing basis, or if it represents a snapshot of a list of items from another source, or whether it is a prepared list where items may be marked as added, modified or deleted.

Sections are used in various ways, and it must be known in what way it is safe to use the entries in them.

This element is labeled as a modifier because a change list must not be misunderstood as a complete list.

The processing mode that applies to this section.

Specifies the order applied to the items in the section entries.

Important for presentation and rendering. Lists may be sorted to place more important information first or to group related entries.

Applications SHOULD render ordered lists in the order provided, but MAY allow users to re-order based on their own preferences as well. If there is no order specified, the order is unknown, though there may still be some order.

What order applies to the items in the entry.

If the section is empty, why the list is empty. An empty section typically has some text explaining the empty reason.

Allows capturing things like "none exist" or "not asked" which can be important for most lists.

The various reasons for an empty section make a significant interpretation to its interpretation. Note that this code is for use when the entire section content has been suppressed, and not for when individual items are omitted - implementers may consider using a text note or a flag on an entry in these cases.

If a section is empty, why it is empty.

A nested sub-section within this section.

Nested sections are primarily used to help human readers navigate to particular portions of the document.