This particular issue shows up quite a bit in standards based exchange, and frankly drives me a bit crazy. Somewhere in the message someone asks for several correlated pieces of information to be communicated. A perfect example of this is in the HITSP C32 Medication template. We had to provide an RxNORM code for the medication, a code for the class of medication, and a code for the dose form within the template. We also had to provide places to put the medication brand and generic names. Folks insisted that all of this information was useful, and therefore must be communicated in the exchange.
However, we used RxNORM codes to describe the medication. Have you ever looked at the content in the RxNORM Vocabulary? If I gave you the RxCUI (code) of 993837 in a communication, here's what RxNORM will tell you about it.
Within the terminology model, I can give you the precise medication ingredients and doses within each tablet, tell you that it is in tablet form intended for oral use, identify the brand name, and generic form. Now, what where you going to do with all of that other information you asked me to code?
Having redundant information is helpful as it helps you spot errors. If the code is 993837 and the reported medication is something other than Tylenol #3 or Acetaminophen 300 mg/ Codeine 30mg, then there is a problem. So, it is helpful to have SOME redundancy. But when all those other codes are also present, the system needs as much knowledge as is already in RxNORM to produce that information, and we just lost some (if not most) of the benefits of using a vocabulary in exchanging the information.
There's so much redundancy in the coded and fielded information in the HITSP C32 Medication template as to be ridiculous (and while I argued against it, I did not succeed). The RxNORM code is all you need, and just to be sure that the sender knows what it is talking about, one of either the brand name, or clinical name of the drug. Everything else after than is redundancy UNLESS you can identify a specific use case for it.
In an information exchange, you should pay attention to exchanges that duplicate already existing knowledge about real things in the world, especially when knowledge bases such as RxNorm exist. The need to exchange world knowledge between systems exists when the receiver of the communication cannot be expected to be readily aware of all of that world knowledge. If I ask you to get rid of the dandelions in my yard, it doesn't really help a whole lot to tell you to get rid of the yellow dandelions, unless I have some very specialized varieties of dandelions or I've been watering them with food die.
If you are expecting someone to transmit information that can be inferred from world knowledge, ask yourself if that is truly necessary. You should always include enough redundancy to enable a receiver to ensure that the sender knows what it is talking about, but don't include so much that a receiver would be overwhelmed, or the sender would basically be duplicating the content of a knowledge source. After all, we have reference works and reference vocabularies so that we can look things up.
Keith
However, we used RxNORM codes to describe the medication. Have you ever looked at the content in the RxNORM Vocabulary? If I gave you the RxCUI (code) of 993837 in a communication, here's what RxNORM will tell you about it.
Within the terminology model, I can give you the precise medication ingredients and doses within each tablet, tell you that it is in tablet form intended for oral use, identify the brand name, and generic form. Now, what where you going to do with all of that other information you asked me to code?
Having redundant information is helpful as it helps you spot errors. If the code is 993837 and the reported medication is something other than Tylenol #3 or Acetaminophen 300 mg/ Codeine 30mg, then there is a problem. So, it is helpful to have SOME redundancy. But when all those other codes are also present, the system needs as much knowledge as is already in RxNORM to produce that information, and we just lost some (if not most) of the benefits of using a vocabulary in exchanging the information.
There's so much redundancy in the coded and fielded information in the HITSP C32 Medication template as to be ridiculous (and while I argued against it, I did not succeed). The RxNORM code is all you need, and just to be sure that the sender knows what it is talking about, one of either the brand name, or clinical name of the drug. Everything else after than is redundancy UNLESS you can identify a specific use case for it.
In an information exchange, you should pay attention to exchanges that duplicate already existing knowledge about real things in the world, especially when knowledge bases such as RxNorm exist. The need to exchange world knowledge between systems exists when the receiver of the communication cannot be expected to be readily aware of all of that world knowledge. If I ask you to get rid of the dandelions in my yard, it doesn't really help a whole lot to tell you to get rid of the yellow dandelions, unless I have some very specialized varieties of dandelions or I've been watering them with food die.
If you are expecting someone to transmit information that can be inferred from world knowledge, ask yourself if that is truly necessary. You should always include enough redundancy to enable a receiver to ensure that the sender knows what it is talking about, but don't include so much that a receiver would be overwhelmed, or the sender would basically be duplicating the content of a knowledge source. After all, we have reference works and reference vocabularies so that we can look things up.
Keith
Attaboy Keith! Could not agree with you more, but the argument we often hear (and likely was why you lost at HITSP) is that obtaining information from the terminology knowledge requires utilizing terminology services, or building your own. Hence the value of CTS or at least common RESTFUL ways to get the terminology knowledge. They DO exist, we just need to encourage folks to embrace this approach.
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