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LHNCBC: Document Abstract
Year: 2007Adobe Acrobat Reader
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2007-001
LOINC - A Master Catalogue of Clinical Observations; Why it is important to clinical care and research
Clement McDonald, Ph.D.
2007-01-30
Most producers of patient level data - including diagnostic labs, many hospital nursing services, other reporting services, and clinical researchers - store their clinical observations electronically. However, data producers identify these observations with their own locally invented and idiosyncratic codes which many other systems do not understand. The resultant Babel is the main barrier to the deployment of effective and interoperable information and research systems - because they all need data from other systems to achieve their promise. Logical Observation Identifiers, Names, and Codes (LOINC) is a database of universal codes and names that if widely adopted would eliminate the Babel and the barrier. This lecture was videotaped and is archived at http://videocast.nih.gov/PastEvents.asp, search for LOINC.