Methods Inf Med 2000; 39(04/05): 278-290
DOI: 10.1055/s-0038-1634396
Original Article
Schattauer GmbH

Change Management of Shared and Local Versions of Health-Care Terminologies

D. E. Oliver
1   Stanford Medical Informatics, Stanford University, Stanford CA, USA
,
Y. Shahar
1   Stanford Medical Informatics, Stanford University, Stanford CA, USA
› Author Affiliations
Further Information

Publication History

Publication Date:
08 February 2018 (online)

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Abstract:

Local sites that adopt a shared health-care terminology for computer-based systems have local needs that prompt the local-terminology maintainers to make changes to the local version of the shared terminology. If the local site is motivated to conform to the shared terminology, then the burden lies with the local site to manage its own changes and to incorporate the changes of the shared version at periodic intervals. We call this process synchronization. We survey current approaches that address problems of sharing and local modification, and we present the CONCORDIA model, which supports carefully controlled divergence of a local version from a shared terminology. CONCORDIA provides the underlying design and methodology for the implementation of a synchronization-support tool.