Governance of FHIR URIs and Resources

Hi Joel,

Look at the complete list that was sent. Half of them are type 4 - exactly duplicating our existing type 4s. Those that are type 3 should not be type 3 as we do not want any other groups creating OIDs for the Alberta Health System - we govern them to prevent poor metadata, and duplicates.

All of the "duplicates" created as type 3s should be changed to type 4. We do not want ANY new type 3 OIDs for Alberta.

The problem with the steps prior to submitting a request is that this is the only place the process has for checking for duplicates. If the requestor doesn't check, or doesn't search properly and doesn't find an existing OID, there is currently no follow on step to ensure that it is not a duplicate. This despite the HL7 registry saying that the OId is created as pending and after review to ensure it is not a duplicate it get set to complete...

As for the flow chart, it is missing key steps on both the Standards SME and HL7 portions. After a submission is reviewed by the SME, it should be checked which jurisdiction the request is for, and then sent for review by that jurisdiction's OID governance team (HISCA/HIS team for Alberta).
After approval from that group, then it can be submitted to HL7. If rejected by the jurisdiction - the request can be revised and resubmitted at the start of the process, abandoned, or if there is an already existing OID for the concept, the requestor can be informed of such.

And for both SME and HL7 processes, they need to verify themselves that the request is not a duplicate. The last step for the SME says "post new OIDs to HL7 community" - what does this mean?

It is clear to me that the process failed on all of these OIDs as the review by SME did not catch the poor quality definitions, nor the duplicates, nor the fact that there is no reason for any of the colleges to be registration authorities. They also left them as owned by a third party that is neither Alberta Health nor the responsible college. All of these things need to be rectified for the future, and I would suggest that Infoway maintain a list of jurisdiction teams responsible for vetting any OIDs for those domains. There should also be a national level team to review any national level OIDs - such as passports and veterans identifiers.

Thanks,
Randy

Hi Randy,

We are currently investigating the duplicated OIDs and are working with the HL7 Registry team to retire the duplicated OIDS once the investigation is completed.

However, I think this is a good time to recap the "OID Registration" process to prevent any future duplication.

The flow chart which is available on the Infocentral OIDs Page has some important steps for the Requestor:

1. Obtain OID request form
2. Verify if OID has been registered - this can be done by visiting - www.hl7.org/oid/index.cfm
3. Use existing OID if found
4. Complete request form and submit

The key step above is the verification process to prevent any issues.

Echoing Iryna's comment there are different types of OIDs.

Type 3: External Group functioning as a Registration Authority. this is used for organizations who which to create their own trees of OIDS for their use. All further additions to this segment of numbers is the responsibility of the "Responsible body" at the time of registration under the ISO 9834 series of principles.

Type 4: This OID is used for namspaces for identifiers that are public such as health card numbers.

Given these definitions, it seems like the descriptions for these OIDs when registerd wasn't clear and some of them may not be duplicates.

This again highlights the fact that at the time of the request, a clear understanding of what type of OID is required and in what context it is being requested.

Please take a moment to review the types of OIDs : wiki.hl7.org/index.php?title=HL7_OID_Registry_Frequently_Asked_Questions for any future requests.

Hi all,

In performing some routine maintenance on our (Alberta’s) OIDs in the HL7 international OID registry, I discovered that someone outside of Alberta’s OID registry team has recently registered several new OIDs that duplicate existing OIDs we had registered up to 12 years ago (that I know of).

It seems there have been several failures in the registration process that also highlights governance issues I see with the new FHIR URI registry.

Here is an example:
2.16.840.1.113883.3.7893 - The College of Podiatric Physicians of Alberta
2.16.840.1.113883.4.747 - College of Podiatric Physicians of Alberta
These 2 OIDs were both granted to new requests, despite the fact that Alberta registered this one a few years ago:
2.16.840.1.113883.4.447 - College of Podiatric Physicians of Alberta, Canada license number

We have found 9 OIDs that were improperly created considering just Alberta. All of the OIDs are related to various colleges in Alberta like the College of Podiatric Physicians of Alberta above. I would suggest that all provinces that have previously registered an OID do a search to see if they too have duplicate entries at HL7 international. In a 5 minute search I was able to find similarly duplicated OIDs belonging to both Ontario and Nova Scotia.

This demonstrates the need for a formal governance process on both URI and Resources registrations pertaining to jurisdictions. I would expect that all provinces would want to be able to have a say in what resources/URI/OIDs are created for concepts in their domain – if for the simple fact of properly preventing duplicates. A further benefit is establishing standard minimum quality of documentation and responsibility of the URIs and resources, as well as having proper contact information to the organizations that ultimately should own the items.

I still need to check the URI registry to see if these items have also been created there without Alberta’s input, but clearly it is quite possible.

I propose that each jurisdiction has a “Registry” team that is contact for all such items prior to their approval (and possible submission to other organizations). For Alberta, this would be our Health Information Standards team, which supports Alberta’s HISCA committee (www.health.alberta.ca/about/HISCA.html).
Contact would be either This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

If there are any FHIR URIs created for Alberta concepts that we haven’t approved, how do we go about taking ownership of them, and revising them to conform to proper guidelines (eg, they should be under the Alberta domain, and not under Ontario)?

Thanks for any help,

Randy Nonay,
BSc(Honours), BAIST, MCP
Conformance and HL7 Standards Analyst
Alberta Health - www.health.alberta.ca/about/HISCA.html
Health Standards, Quality and Performance Division
Analytics and Performance Reporting Branch
Data Management Unit
Health Information Standards Team