Referral Forms and Supporting Information

This iGuide defines baseline messaging requirements for eReferral but not the forms or clinical data that must be sent with a ServiceRequest. Therefore, implementers SHALL anticipate the need to discuss and mutually agree on the approach that will be used to support different requests and referral pathways. This includes any forms that may be used to inititate the referral and the format of any required supporting information that must be attached.

This iGuide and the FHIR profiles within it provide a few different options for attaching supporting information to a ServiceRequest, including:

• Converting the information collected within a form into human-readable text and including it in the ServiceRequest.note.text element;
• Using one of several different FHIR resources that can be referenced in ServiceRequest.supportingInfo and then included in the message payload as a Bundle.entry:
  • QuestionnaireResponse to provide structured form data as a list of questions and responses. QuestionnaireResponse.text narrative field should be used to provide unstructured data such a copy-paste or summary of the Questionnaire response, or
  • DocumentReference to provide a binary attachment that's available to retrieve from a server using a url (recommended) or as base64 encoded data included in the resource.

Where there is a requirement to exchange structured clinical information supported by other FHIR resources implementers MAY engage and collaborate with the eReferral Interoperability Working Group to profile specific FHIR resources with the expectation of contributing them to a future version of this iGuide.