HL7

What is HL7?

Health Level Seven is one of several American National Standards Institute (ANSI) -accredited Standards Developing Organizations (SDOs) operating in the healthcare arena. Most SDOs produce standards (sometimes called specifications or protocols) for a particular healthcare domain such as pharmacy, medical devices, imaging or insurance (claims processing) transactions. Health Level Seven’s domain is clinical and administrative data. Our mission is to: To provide standards for the exchange, management and integration of data that support clinical patient care and the management, delivery and evaluation of healthcare services. Specifically, to create flexible, cost effective approaches, standards, guidelines, methodologies, and related services for interoperability between healthcare information systems.

Headquartered in Ann Arbor, MI, Health Level Seven is like most of the other SDOs in that it is a not-for-profit volunteer organization. Its members-- providers, vendors, payers, consultants, government groups and others who have an interest in the development and advancement of clinical and administrative standards for healthcare—develop the standards. Like all ANSI-accredited SDOs, Health Level Seven adheres to a strict and well-defined set of operating procedures that ensures consensus, openness and balance of interest. A frequent misconception about Health Level Seven (and presumably about the other SDOs) is that it develops software. In reality, Health Level Seven develops specifications, the most widely used being a messaging standard that enables disparate healthcare applications to exchange keys sets of clinical and administrative data.

Members of Health Level Seven are known collectively as the Working Group, which is organized into technical committees and special interest groups. The technical committees are directly responsible for the content of the Standards. Special interest groups serve as a test bed for exploring new areas that may need coverage in HL7’s published standards. A list of the technical committees and special interest groups as well as their missions, scopes and current leadership is available on this web site.

What Does the Name HL7 Mean

Level Seven refers to the highest level of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) communications model for Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) - the application level. The application level addresses definition of the data to be exchanged, the timing of the interchange, and the communication of certain errors to the application. The seventh level supports such functions as security checks, participant identification, availability checks, exchange mechanism negotiations and, most importantly, data exchange structuring.

Why HL7

There are several health care standards development efforts currently underway throughout the world. Why then, embrace HL7? HL7 is singular as it focuses on the interface requirements of the entire health care organization, while most other efforts focus on the requirements of a particular department. Moreover, on an ongoing basis, HL7 develops a set of protocols on the fastest possible track that is both responsive and responsible to its members. The group addresses the unique requirements of already installed hospital and departmental systems, some of which use mature technologies.

While HL7 focuses on addressing immediate needs, the group continues to dedicate its efforts to ensuring concurrence with other United States and International standards development activities. Argentina, Australia, Canada, China, Czech Republic, Finland, Germany, India, Japan, Korea, Lithuania, The Netherlands, New Zealand, Southern Africa, Switzerland, Taiwan, Turkey and the United Kingdom are part of HL7 initiatives. Moreover, HL7 is an American National Standards Institute (ANSI) approved Standards Developing Organization (SDO). HL7 strives to identify and support the diverse requirements of each of its membership constituencies: Users, Vendors, and Consultants. Cognizant of their needs, requirements, priorities and interests, HL7 supports all groups as they make important contributions to the quality of the organization. The committee structure, balanced balloting procedures and open membership policies ensure that all requirements are addressed uniformly and equitably with quality and consistency.

How is HL7 Organized

The organization is managed by a Board of Directors, which is comprised of eight elected positions and three appointed positions. The organization is comprised of Technical Committees and Special Interest Groups that are responsible for defining the HL7 standard protocol. Each Technical Committee and Special Interest group is chaired by two or more co-chairs. Collectively, the co-chairs comprise the Technical Steering Committee, which votes on issues related to the standard. Votes of the Technical Steering Committee as passed as recommendations to the Board of Directors, who make the final decision. HL7 members are encouraged to participate in all of these committees.