WS/PIDS: standard interoperable PIDS in web services environments

Area of Science:

• Health Informatics
• Computer Science
• Web Services

Background:

• Electronic health records (EHRs) require robust identity management for seamless data exchange.
• The current standard, Person Identification Service (PIDS), is a CORBA specification lacking explicit support for multimedia attributes.

Purpose of the Study:

• To introduce WS/PIDS, a Web Services (WS)-based specification for person identification.
• To enhance the existing PIDS standard with support for medical multimedia attributes.
• To ensure interoperability and compliance with emerging WS standards.

Main Methods:

• Developed WS/PIDS, a specification closely matching PIDS but adapted for Web Services.
• Created a test implementation with Java-, .NET-, and Web-based clients, layered on a PIDS back-end.
• Ensured WS/PIDS preserves PIDS semantics and supports multimedia data.

Main Results:

• WS/PIDS demonstrates interoperability across platforms.
• The specification largely preserves PIDS semantics.
• A test implementation is available, supporting diverse clients and use cases.

Conclusions:

• WS/PIDS offers an open-source, usable solution for dynamic clinical systems in grid environments.
• It successfully addresses the need for consistent identity handling, including multimedia, in EHRs.
• The standard is validated through comprehensive use cases and is currently used in clinical research.