openEHR Terminology


Introduction

This page provides access to the XML computable expression of the openEHR terminology, and a set of tools to support the use of this terminology in a variety of contexts including the Archetype Editor. The openEHR terminology (documentary specification) is an adjunct to the openEHR reference and archetype models, and provides code sets and vocabularies needed by the models which are language independent. It is not a "real-world" ontology of any kind - i.e. it does not contain representation of facts in areas such as diseases or biochemistry - this is the job of much larger terminologies such as ICDx, ICPC, SNOMED-CT and so on.

The file contains:
It presently includes the translations of all languages - this will be handled in separate files in future.

File structure

The concepts are provided in a file called Terminology.xml with an associated schema, Terminology.xsd. The schema is an XML schema - documentation of this file is provided.  The file and schema are provided here.

Tools

Tools for manipulating the terminology have been developed for the openEHR Foundation by Ocean Informatics. Two tools are provided to manage this small terminology. Please note that the Terminology tool is provided for interest - any wanting to translate or alter this termset needs to contact Ocean Informatics to ensure the upgrade is coordinated. The Translation tool can be used independently, submitting the translated Terminology.xml file to Ocean Informatics for incorporation into the main file. (As explained above, the language specific files will be distributed separately in future). The files are:
  1. The openEHR Terminology tool which allows the user to expand the terminology, add groups and edit any concepts in any language. This tool includes the translation tool.
  2. The openEHR Translation tool which allows the user to translate the terminology to a new language. This can display all terms, or only those that are requiring translation.
The tools are provided as .Zipped .exe files. They need to be saved to and run in the same directory as the Terminology.xml file.

Future Work

The current design of the openEHR Support Terminology is adequate for the purpose but there are potential improvements to this design. The most critical of these is to separate the language specific terms from the master concepts and groups. The current tools are written in VB.Net by Ocean Informatics - the source code of these applications can be made available to those seeking to improve this terminology.

Acknowledgements

This work has been carried out by Ocean Informatics for the openEHR Foundation.

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