FHIR Product Priorities for Release 4

May 4, 2017

Now that we’ve published Release 3 of FHIR, it’s time for us to consider our main priorities for the next FHIR release. This is my draft list of product priorities that we’ll be discussing - and trying to execute - at the Madrid meeting next week: * Normative: push to normative for

  • Foundation / API / XML / JSON / Bundle / OperationOutcome
  • Terminology Service (ValueSet / CodeSystem / ExpansionProfile)
  • StructureDefinition / CapabilityStatement

  • Patient / RelatedPerson / Practitioner / Organization / ?Endpoint

  • Position a core set of clinical resources (‘health base’?) for normative in R5 (or Observation AllergyIntolerance MedicationStatement normative for R4?)
  • JSON: ? use manifest for extensions, parameters resource (see blog post) (note that discussion on this didn’t go very well - probably will be dropped)
  • RDF: more ontology bindings + resolve status of JSON-LD
  • Data Analytics: support for a bulk data analysis bridge format (Apache Parquet?)
  • API: better control over retrieving graphs, and value added query support (tabular format?)
  • Patterns: change the W5 framework to a pattern (logical model), tie the patterns to ontology, and use of patterns to drive more consistency (and how to do this without decreasing quality)
  • Services: more services. Candidates: conformance, registry, personal health summary?, etc?
  • Deployment: get a clear standards path for smart on fhir / cds-hooks (and alignment with UMA/Heart)
  • FM: work on alignment between FM resources and the rest of FHIR

Note that this list is written anticipating that the normal standards development process occur, and the content as a whole is maintained. I’d expect that this would amount to 1000s of tasks. So this list is not a list of ‘what will change in R4’, but an indication of where particular focus will be applied by the FHIR leadership (so don’t be concerned if a particular issue of yours is not on this list, as long as it’s in gForge)