FHIR Infrastructure
Background
FHIR is a healthcare information exchange standard that makes use of an HL7-defined set of “resources” to support information sharing by a variety of means, including documents, messages, services and RESTful interfaces. FHIR defines resources for clinical and administrative content (e.g. Observation, Patient, etc.) as well as resources for “infrastructure” purposes. Some of these infrastructure resources are used to define the standard itself – i.e. what the characteristics of resources are, what codes can be used in them, etc. This set of infrastructure resources is referred to as the “Conformance resources”. The complete list of them can be found here: http://build.fhir.org/conformance-module.html
Mission
The FHIR Core Work Group (FHIR) is a content development work group (peer of other domain content work groups) responsible for the development and maintenance of a delineated set of core components of the FHIR specification, thereby enabling other work groups to develop FHIR resources, profiles and implementation guides.
Charter
Work Products and Contributions to HL7 Processes
FHIR Core Work Group is responsible for FHIR content creation and maintenance in the following areas:
- Developing and maintaining the FHIR conformance resources - those resources that define how to conform to FHIR and thus what FHIR is.
- Developing and maintaining specification pages that define core capabilities of FHIR. E.g. Tags, bundles, compartments, extensibility, narrative -
- Developing and maintaining the documentation around how FHIR bundles and resources are used within the various interoperability paradigms (REST, Messaging, Documents, etc.) and ensuring coherence and alignment of the content shared in those paradigms
- Developing and maintaining the documentation around the RESTful transport of FHIR content for the various paradigms.
- Acting as temporary custodian for FHIR artifacts which the FHIR Management Group has not found an alternative Work Group willing to and/or capable of managing the development and maintenance of.[1]
- Acting as a coordination point for the development of publication and reference implementation tooling related to the FHIR specification.
- Acting as nominal host for joint meetings between work groups and FHIR methodology and management.
[1] The FHIR Management Group has the authority to temporarily or permanently assign resources to any work group. While resources may be assigned to FHIR Core on a temporary basis, they are not a “preferred” holder for otherwise unassigned resources. The FMG will make every effort to find the most appropriate work group based on bandwidth, domain expertise with the content and a willingness to undertake the work.
Formal Relationships With Other HL7 Groups
The FHIR Core work group:
- is subject to oversight by the Technical Steering Committee (TSC), like all work groups
- is subject to the oversight of the Terminology Services Management Group (TSMG) with respect to the terminology artifacts created or used within artifacts under FHIR-I control
- is responsible for developing and managing FHIR artifacts assigned to it by and adheres to the ballot and publication timelines established by the FHIR Management Group (FMG)
- adheres to the design and maintenance methodology and quality guidelines established by Modeling and Methodology (MnM) work group
- adheres to terminology methodology established jointly by the Vocabulary and Modeling and Methodology (MnM) work groups
- coordinates with a number of work groups who have a vested interest in the conformance resources and in any artifacts the FMG has granted FHIR Core temporary custodianship for.
- Responsibilities:
- The workgroups listed below are responsible for defining the core abstract architectural principles for these areas.
- The FHIR Infractructure workgroup applies these principles in consultation with the respective workgroups in defining the FHIR design and implementation artifacts, i.e. the resources listed below.
- These include:
- Conformance – Conformance, Profile, ExtensionDefinition resources
- Vocabulary – ValueSet, ConceptMap, NamingSystem resources
- Structure Documents (SD) – Document paradigm
- Infrastructure and Messaging (InM) – Messaging paradigm
- Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) – Services Paradigm
- Implementable Technology Specifications (ITS) – REST paradigm
NOTE: specific resources listed are for example purposes. The specific resources and pages of joint interest will continue to evolve
- collaborates with the following organization support work groups:
- Publishing, Electronic Services & Tools (PEST) –
- Provide electronic access to the published FHIR standards
- Responsible for overseeing the tools used for the development and maintenance of FHIR artifacts used by HL7 internal participants or managed by HL7 for support of the implementation community, particularly around the long term maintainability and sustainability.
- Includes applying all of the HL7 publication management precepts required
- Is responsible for archiving, ballot publication and ballot management of the FHIR specification.
- Responsible for official release of the FHIR specification.
- Responsible for ensuring that the FHIR publication format meets HL7 standard requirements, i.e. ANSI rules
- Is consulted by a number of other work groups which have ownership of key aspects of FHIR, including:
- Implementable Technology Specifications (ITS) – XML, JSON and RDF syntaxes
- Modeling and Methodology (MnM) – FHIR Data types, mapping FHIR resources to RIM
- Vocabulary – FHIR code-related data types (CodableConcept, Coding & code) in coordination with MnM
- Security – FHIR Security-related pages
Notes:
- FHIR core does not have any authority over the activities of other work groups. Oversight of FHIR across work groups is a responsibility of the FHIR Management Group (FMG).
- FHIR Core is responsible for defining the base structures and technologies allowing FHIR interoperability – i.e. what FHIR implementers do. Modeling and Methodology (MnM) is responsible for defining the methodology of how FHIR artifacts (resources, profiles, value sets, etc.) are created – i.e. what HL7 WGs produce. Where this methodology includes processes relating to conformance and profiling, this will be done in consultation with CGIT. Similarly, methodology related to terminology will be done in consultation with Vocabulary.
- Temporary assignments of resources are intended to be temporary. It is the responsibility of the FHIR Management Group (FMG) to assist work groups with bandwidth, training or other issues to ensure a long-term home for all FHIR artifacts.
- While FHIR Core is likely to be a magnet for FHIR-related engagement due to the name, the intention is for all domain-specific work to be conducted within its respective domain work groups.
Formal Relationship With Groups Outside of HL7
None
2016 Work Group Health All-Star Award Winner
This WG earned a WG Healthiest Star rating in each of the three trimesters measured in 2016.
2020 May Work Group Health Gold Star Award Winner
This Work Group earned a WG Healthiest Star rating in May 2020.
2020 Work Group Health All-Star Award Winner
This WG earned a WG Healthiest Star rating in each of the three trimesters measured in 2020.
Date of Last Revision
January 31, 2022