A method for specification of structured clinical content in electronic health records

The Copenhagen County is using clinical guidelines in the electronic health record development to provide documentation support, process support and decision support for the healthcare professionals. The electronic health record development is based on three main components: The first component is a national information model. The second component is a common classification system (SNOMED). The third key component is the so-called "clinical content". This paper describes the structured "clinical content", how it is linked to the clinical process, and how it is used to create clinical guidelines in the form of standard care plans. The Copenhagen County and MEDIQ has developed a methodology for identifying and specifying structured "clinical content" to be used in electronic health records. The method combines analyses of national clinical guidelines with local experience and practices and it heavily involves healthcare professionals. The method includes four main steps: Analyses of background material, analyses of clinical process-flow, mapping to standards (the national information model and the common classification system), and specification of the structured clinical content itself. Three secondary steps may be added to specify the clinical content in more detail: Workflow analyses, analyses of quality indicators, and decision analyses. This paper reports the experiences using the method and stresses the demand for a common exchange format and IT-tools for documenting clinical content in a formalised way.