Semantic Interoperability of Nursing Data - Mapping an Interface Terminology to SNOMED CT.

Area of Science:

• Health Informatics
• Nursing Informatics
• Terminology Management

Background:

• Effective eHealth data exchange relies on standardized terminologies.
• Nursing intervention data needs consistent representation across primary (HIS) and secondary (EPD) systems.
• The LEP nursing interface terminology is widely used in German-speaking countries.

Purpose of the Study:

• To map nursing interventions from the LEP terminology to SNOMED CT.
• To facilitate semantic interoperability for nursing data in eHealth systems.
• To support the integration of nursing data across different healthcare information systems.

Main Methods:

• Nursing interventions from LEP Nursing Version 3.5.0 were mapped to SNOMED CT (version 2022-12-31).
• Mapping was supported by the National Release Center Switzerland.
• New submissions were incorporated into SNOMED CT international and Swiss extensions.

Main Results:

• 467 nursing interventions from LEP were successfully mapped to SNOMED CT procedures.
• 83 new nursing intervention concepts were submitted to SNOMED CT.
• Seven new concepts were added to the Swiss SNOMED CT extension.

Conclusions:

• The developed mapping provides a foundation for semantic interoperability of nursing interventions.
• Future work will involve testing the mapping's effectiveness in real-world nursing practice.
• This initiative advances standardized nursing data representation in eHealth.