This page is part of the FHIR Specification (v1.8.0: STU 3 Draft). The current version which supercedes this version is 5.0.0. For a full list of available versions, see the Directory of published versions . Page versions: R5 R4B R4 R3

Work Group Patient Administration

Ballot Status: n/a

8.0 Administration Module

8.0.1 Introduction

The Administrative module covers the base data that is then linked into the other modules for clinical content, finance/billing, workflow, etc.
This of course is built on the FHIR technology platform modules.

Before any clinical data can be recorded, the basic information on the patient must be recorded, and then often the basis of the interaction (such as an encounter)

8.0.2 Index

Patient RelatedPerson Group Practitioner PractitionerRole

Organization Location HealthcareService Endpoint

EpisodeOfCare Encounter Account Flag

Device DeviceComponent DeviceMetric Substance

8.0.2.1 Patient Registers

Track people involved in receiving healthcare, the basics nearly everything else references back to

Name	Aliases	Description
Patient	SubjectOfCare Client Resident	Demographics and other administrative information about an individual or animal receiving care or other health-related services.
RelatedPerson		Information about a person that is involved in the care for a patient, but who is not the target of healthcare, nor has a formal responsibility in the care process.
Person		Demographics and administrative information about a person independent of a specific health-related context.
Group		Represents a defined collection of entities that may be discussed or acted upon collectively but which are not expected to act collectively and are not formally or legally recognized; i.e. a collection of entities that isn't an Organization.

Note: Patient linking should also be considered when evaluating searches with references to other resources. e.g. Searching for conditions for a patient.
At present the specification does not define if the links should be also followed to include conditions that reference the linked patients too. We are currently seeking feedback on this.

Note: The Person resource may be used as a centralized register of people that may eventually be involved in healthcare, and could be used as the central coe demographics register.
However the fields/values in Person are duplicated in the other resources, and in many cases the Person resource will be hosted on external systems.

8.0.2.2 Clinical Categorization Resources

Most clinical actitivies occur grouped in some way. Long term care is typically covered by an EpisodeOfCare, where short term care by encounters. Account associates the tracking of transactions back to a Patient (or other resource). Flag is just used to highlight a warning or other notification about a patient (or other resource)

Name	Aliases	Description
EpisodeOfCare	Case Program Problem	An association between a patient and an organization / healthcare provider(s) during which time encounters may occur. The managing organization assumes a level of responsibility for the patient during this time.
Encounter	Visit	An interaction between a patient and healthcare provider(s) for the purpose of providing healthcare service(s) or assessing the health status of a patient.
Account	Cost center	A financial tool for tracking value accrued for a particular purpose. In the healthcare field, used to track charges for a patient, cost centers, etc.
Flag	Barriers to Care, Alert	Prospective warnings of potential issues when providing care to the patient.

Note: Resources shown with a dotted box are described in other sections of the specification: Coverage and Claim are from the section on Finance.

8.0.2.3 Service Provider Directory Resources

Service Directory resources are usually stored in the administration section of applications, and may even be synchronized from external systems.

Name	Aliases	Description
Organization		A formally or informally recognized grouping of people or organizations formed for the purpose of achieving some form of collective action. Includes companies, institutions, corporations, departments, community groups, healthcare practice groups, etc.
Location		Details and position information for a physical place where services are provided and resources and participants may be stored, found, contained or accommodated.
Practitioner		A person who is directly or indirectly involved in the provisioning of healthcare.
PractitionerRole		A specific set of Roles/Locations/specialties/services that a practitioner may perform at an organization for a period of time.
HealthcareService		The details of a healthcare service available at a location.
Endpoint		The technical details of an endpoint that can be used for electronic services, such as for web services providing XDS.b or a REST endpoint for another FHIR server. This may include any security context information.

Note: The PractitionerRole resource is new concept enabling the seperation of roles from core details. It has been tested at several Provider Directory Connectathons, and will be re-verified at the January 2017 WGM.
The Role component in Practitioner is likely be removed in the near future once other flow-on effects have been considered completely.

8.0.2.4 Devices and Substances

Other assets are often registered in the administration system, and maintained as master files.

Name	Aliases	Description
Device		This resource identifies an instance or a type of a manufactured item that is used in the provision of healthcare without being substantially changed through that activity. The device may be a medical or non-medical device. Medical devices includes durable (reusable) medical equipment, implantable devices, as well as disposable equipment used for diagnostic, treatment, and research for healthcare and public health. Non-medical devices may include items such as a machine, cellphone, computer, application, etc.
DeviceComponent		Describes the characteristics, operational status and capabilities of a medical-related component of a medical device.
DeviceMetric		Describes a measurement, calculation or setting capability of a medical device.
Substance		A homogeneous material with a definite composition.

8.0.3 Security and Privacy

Patient privacy is handled with security labels and tags in the Resource Meta property. This is the standard way that the FHIR specification provides this supporting information to a sub-system that implements it (which is not defined by FHIR).

One of the more common use cases is for marking a patient as being a celebrity.

Note that privacy considerations apply to Person, Practitioner and RelatedPerson records in addition to Patient's.

While Organization, Location, Device and other non-person-identifying records are generally subject to less stringent security precautions, such data must still be protected to avoid safety issues (e.g. someone maliciously changing the ingredients associated with a drug to cause/fail to cause alerts)

Devices can be linked to Patients. If this occurs, they must be protected as any other patient-linked element

For more general considerations, see the Security and Privacy module.

8.0.4 Common use Cases

All systems require access to administrative resources, such as for:

• Maintaining master file lists of patients, practitioners, organizations, locations, etc.
• Synchronizing/interrogating content from an external registry. Such as a Services Directory or centralized Person register

8.0.5 Developmental Roadmap

The Patient Administration is currently working through resources that support:

• Encounters and Scheduling (enhance maturity of encounters and further develop in/outpatient scheduling)
• Service Provider Directory (in co-ordination with the Argonaut Provider Directory group)
• Financial Management interactions (account/coverage, then billable item, which links administration to billing)

Many of the administrative resources are part of the core resources that most systems use first and have formed the basis for most people's first experiences with FHIR.
However this limited exposure has still to be proven in all contexts, such as veterinary, public health and clinical research.