Overview

This document provides a documentary expression of the openEHR Support Terminology, consisting of code sets and vocabulary that provide values for the coded attributes in the openEHR Reference Model. The computable form of this terminology is available in the openEHR specifications-TERM repository, and is the definitive expression. Access to the terminology in the openEHR reference model is via the classes defined in the package rm.support.terminology.

There are two types of coded entities used in openEHR. The first is codes that are self-defining, and which do not have separate rubrics, i.e. the code 'stands for itself'. The ISO country and language codes are examples of this, as are code groups for such concepts as 'integrity check algorithm names'. These are represented in openEHR by the CODE_PHRASE type (found in the rm.data_types.text package). Value sets that cannot meaningfully be translated into other languages and which do not have definitions beyond their code value are usually candidates for being a code set rather than a terminology group. The code sets described in this document are mostly internet vocabularies defined by ISO or IETF. This document does not change the definition, it only a) indicates which codes sets are used for what purpose in openEHR and b) assigns them a logical name by which they are referred to in the openEHR models.

The second category of coded entities are true coded terms, where each code is a concept identifier, for which there is a rubric and description, potentially in multiple languages. In other words, the way of linguistically expressing the concept is dependent on the language one is working in. Most clinical terminologies are in this category, e.g. ICD10, ICPC, as well as the vocabularies in the openEHR Terminology described here. Terms in this category are expressed by instances of the openEHR data type DV_CODED_TEXT, which uses the CODE_PHRASE type to contain its defining code, as well as any mapped codes. The openEHR Terminology is a collection of vocabularies required for various attributes in the openEHR Reference and Archetype Models, each identified by a logical name such as "audit change type".

The openEHR Terminology vocabularies provide mappings to other recognised terminologies or vocabularies where available. Given that the attributes defined here are mostly coded attributes (i.e. predefined in the openEHR Reference Model), mappings tend to be to terms in vocabularies defined by standards organisations such as CEN and HL7, rather than large clinical vocabularies such as WHO ICD10.