HL7 Technical Steering Committee Meeting May 18, 1993 Minutes Page 1 Attending: Mark McDougall Kathy Milholland Ted Lau Ed Hammond, MD Wayne Tracy Jim Adams Mead Walker John Quinn Mark Shaferman Wes Rishel Clem McDonald, MD Debbie Hess Jeff Gautney Diane Kravec John Hoben Meeting called to order at 7:12 PM AGENDA 1. State of Ballots a. Negative Ballotting b. Ballotting Procedures 2. Technical Secretary 3. Version 2.2 Style Issues 4. Medical Records segments a. New segments 5. Scheduling 6. Commonality of definitions and terms @ John Quinn introduced Jeff Gautney of E&Y (will be taking minutes for this meeting) and Jim Adams, new member of the HL7 administrative staff. @ John Quinn informed the group that Wes Rishel will be stepping down as Technical Secretary. He will make an offer to the full Working Group tomorrow for volunteers for this position. @John Quinn distributed HL7 Negative Balloting procedures for review. He voiced a desire to eventually get this document into the procedures. - John voiced a desire to better document negative ballots - Differences between ASTM, IEEE Medix and HL7 were reviewed and discussed - ASTM sends out documents for ballotting. Negatives are collected and corrected, and the document is not re-ballotted. This was not deemed desirable by the committee. - Desire to be consistent with the ANSI procedures. Would send back the negative unresolved comments/arguements (not the ballots) along with the chair@s comments, and ask the full membership of they agree, and ask the negative ballotter if they wish to change their vote. @ John Quinn asked Debbie and Ed to work on consolidating the ballots into a coherent version for 2.2 @ Ed Hammond discussed Version 2.2 style issues - Ed postulated the idea that the transaction tables themselves would be moved to an annex, allowing the standard to be changed - Ed used IEEE and OSI manuals as guidelines for developing these standards. He posed the following issues for the group to vote on: - Should the TOC in the standard only be in the beginning for the final documents (no more chapter TOCs, except in draft documents)? YES - Should the segments be in logical order or alphabetical order? LOGICAL ORDER - AN INDEX WILL BE INCLUDED - Debbie will now be known as the Standards Document Editor - Should the examples stay with the specification, or be moved to the implementation guide so that it can be changed regardless of the spec version (and vice versa)? Vote was 9-1 in favor of keeping the examples with the specs. This is unlike X.12, where the spec is pure and other @interpretative@ guides include the examples (actually published by other organizations). The example/Implementation Guide would be ballotted, as the spec is. - Should @for example@ tables (e.g., open tables, like ethnicity code) move to an appendix (as opposed to being part of the spec), such that they can be updated without ballotting. This issue garnered a lot of discussion. @ Wayne Tracy described three classes of tables: Illustrative (open), Required, and Externally Defined (i.e., CPT-4). @ Very concerned that the document make it very clear what tables/values are required vs. those which are truly examples @ Vote was 9-1 in favor of keeping the example codes in the document, with more explicit acentuation of the differences to show example vs required value tables - Do we distinguish between a code set table (IDs) and other general tables? Should Code Set Tables have unique idenifiers which distinguish them from general tables? Vote was unanimous in favor of this. NEW RULES postulated by Ed - Cutoff days must be established by the Tech Comm Chair real & absolute (starting with Version 2.2) - All changes once submitted to Debbie must be made in hard copy - Debbie will clean up the version diskette - The document will be returned to the Tech Comm chair; they will review this and give the chairs a sign-off form. This will be the authorization to release the document for ballotting - Can@t refer to any previous versions of the standard in the standard themselves. Have to include this documentation in the document as an example. Could include as an informative part of the document; could also include former version comparative info as informational only - not part of the standard. Measure passed unanimously. - Tech Comm Chairs are responsible for insuring that the examples are correct - How will the Code Set Tables be numbered? Ed postulated that Debbie assign the unique identifiers in sequential order. The group agreed with this unanimously. Mead Walker asked that no capitals would be used. John Quinn asked that numbers not be reused. Existing tables will not be renumbered; new tables will be added in the gaps for V 2.2; other spaces will be filler as NO LONGER USED; and new numbers will added to the end. - Ed will suggest to the Exec Comm that the old QA Committee be removed from the Data Modelling committee, and be resolved as the Standards Review Committee - Shall we ballot 2.2 (for 2.2 ONLY) as a complete document to the Working Group, or ballot each chapter seperately? Could send out as one document and ask for individual chapter ballots (so negative ballots could be done for an individual chapter). Vote was passed 10-1. - Ed posed to the group the suggestion that chairs submit their spec documents in (version 2.2 ONLY): @ Hard copy and diskette @ Word Perfect 5.1 (including all tables and graphics) @ If desiring to transmit electronically, transmit document to HL7 headquarters via e-mail using PK.ZIP (available on Internet). Wes will prepare instructions for everyone on how to get and use PK.ZIP. @ Chapter titles will be 36 pt Times/Roman @ Ed reviewed several key aspects of formatting for the documents @ Table of contents will list segments but not fields (fields will be in the Index) - Each chapter will begin with an overview which includes scope and purpose; second part will list all reference documents. Vote was 8-2 in favor. - Indexing will be done at the field element level; will be performed by the Standards Document Editor & the Technical Secretary - Full document will include a Bibliography and a Glossary (Technical Secretary will be responsible for developing and maintaining the Glossary) - All comments discussed above will be put into a Version Standards guide that will be circulated to the Chapter Chairs - Technical Committee chair will be responsible for writing Chapter 1 (the overview) Ed reiterated that Debbie is the editor, not the writer All chapters for 2.2 are out for ballot, with the exception of Chapter 4 @ Medical Records group is seeking status change from a SIG to a full Chapter status, with explicit messages defined - Wayne distributed one copy of draft segments that support JCAHO 94 draft standards - Wayne explained the rationale behind this motion - Asked the group if they approved that the group could request ballotting for this promotion to full status - Clem requested that the chapter be named appropriately, to reflect that the chapter deals specifically with Medical Records Department functions, and not the CPR. Wes seconded this concern. Kathy requested that the name be coordinated with the JCAHO standards - Wes & Clem raised concerns re: coordination between different groups defining the same information (i.e., coding diagnosis) - Wayne will present a formal committee proposal and charter to the group; these messages will not be part of 2.2 (possibly a later update); the group informally approved the idea @ John Quinn forwarded the idea of a seperate chapter (post 2.2) to address Scheduling specifically, given that AHISPP has said that HL7 will be doing Scheduling. Mead suggested that Scheduling be made into a committee, and that the Inter-Enterprise Technical Committee be downgraded to a SIG. John Hoben raised the issue of other related messages (e.g., referrals). Wes seconded this and requested that the name be reformulated. John Hoben will put a proposal together to reform/rename/etc. to refocus attention on Scheduling. @ Kathy Milholland and the Patient Care SIG are running into problems of defining terms (i.e., defining provider vs. practitioner, encounter vs. episode). Debbie and Ed suggested that this issue will be resolved by the Tehnical Secretary in the Glossary. The group requested that Kathy distribute any terms and definitions that their group has already developed to the Tech Steering Comm for review. The Glossary will be put into 2.2. Should go out in the minutes to the HL7 membership. Will also be put into the HL7 Newsletter. The Tech Secretary will serve as Editor, not as purely the developer of the Glossary. @ The Pt Care SIG will begin to search for a new co-Chairman @ All joint working group meetings will be named MSDS Joint Working Group meetings @ Mark requested: - by 8/1/93, all Tech Chairs need to develop a 1-2 page scope/description of their Technical Committee (e.g., sales brochure) - Thurs AM at the Gerneral Session, Clem will give an update on the Joint Committees progress Meeting adjourned at 9:25 PM.