Clinical Context Object Workgroup
Merged with Infrastructure and MessagingStatus
Merged with Infrastructure and Messaging.
Mission
With an emphasis on the point-of-use of applications, the mission of the HL7 CCOW Work Group is to define standards that enable the visual integration of healthcare applications. Applications are visually integrated when they work together in ways that the user can see in order to enhance the user's ability to incorporate information technology as part of the care delivery process.
Charter
CCOW standards specify technology-neutral architectures, component interfaces, and data definitions as well as an array of interoperable technology-specific mappings of these architectures, interfaces, and definitions. It is the intent of CCOW that its standards may be implemented using broadly accepted and/or industry standard computing technologies, with emphasis on those that are most relevant to the HL7 membership. It is also the intent of CCOW that its specifications provide all of the details needed to ensure robust and consistent implementations of compliant applications and system services. However, CCOW does not intend for its specifications to serve as an implementation or the design of an implementation.
Work Products and Contributions to HL7 Processes
Since its inception, CCOW has focused on specifying the Context Management Standard. Context management entails the coordination and synchronization of applications so that they are mutually aware of the set of common things - known as the context - that frame and constrain the user's interactions with applications.
The context is primarily comprised of the identity of real-world things, such as patients, and real-world concepts, such as encounters, that establish the common basis for a consistent set of user interactions with a set of healthcare applications. The elements of the context may be provided directly by users as they interact with applications, or may be provided automatically by underlying programmatic sources.
Specifically, the Context Management Standard defines a protocol for securely "linking" applications so that they "tune" to the same context. The context is represented as a set of subjects, each of which generally identifies a real-world entity such as a patient or a real-world concept such as an encounter. Linked applications remain automatically synchronized even when a context subject changes; for example, due to the user's inputs (e.g., the user selects a different patient). The user inputs of particular interest are those that are used to identify something, such as medical record number for patients, or an account number for a clinical encounter.
Formal Relationships With Other HL7 Groups
Because of the critical need for trustworthy information in context, CCOW has developed a formal relationship with the HL7 Security Work Group. Our joint efforts have produced three protection profiles that can be used in a security assessment or can be incorporated into a protection profile as part of a common criteria evaluation. Our joint work also includes adding support for the use of SAML assertions during the authentication of users into the CCOW context.
Decision Making Practices Addendum
Decision Making Practices Addendum (109 KB)
Date of Last Revision
April 2, 2010