Hugh, > The argument comes when you say that every data point in an archetype > needs to be coded and here there are arguments both ways. I would say > that it is unnecessary to code every data point. There is little > benefit for instance in coding sitting, lying, standing, reclining n a > blood pressure archetype. The archetype contrains the value of > position to these four values. The values are in context and their > meaning is clear to anyone using this archetype. Translation is much > easier as the archetype gives an absolute context for the meaning of > the term. Coding these terms in SNOMED would be so that you can query > your health record for every "standing" item? Its pretty unlikely > that this would be a useful requirement. Coding everything s going to > be a very slow and enormously expensive process to get right. It > makes translation of archetypes much more difficult, especially for > those many countries that don't (yet) have a SNOMED translation. > Building archetypes is proving to be a very rapid and useful process.
I think that there can be more reasons for binding archetype nodes to external terminologies apart from information re-use requirements in the "query for everything standing" example, e.g. to be able to express that "standing" in one archetype has the same meaning as "standing" in another archetype. Also, I didn't realise that I said that everything necessarily should be coded. Referring to David Markwell's report, he states (more or less) that things in the "grey zone" should be represented redundantly but he also states that terminology binding requirements should be driven by information re-use requirements. I agree with him on both points. /Daniel
