HAPI Conformance Classes System
User Manual
Frequently Asked Questions
Message Profile
Q. What is a message profile and why is it important?
A. A message profile is a detailed specification for a message structure. For more information please visit the Conformance Special Interest Group page on www.hl7.org.
A. HL7 messages have a hierarchical format. At the top of the hierarchy is a message. A message can have one or more segments or segment groups. Each segment can have one or more fields. Each field can have one or more components. Each component may or may not have sub-components.
All of these items can carry various standardized codes. The message could, for example, carry the code ADT, which signifies the data of the admission of a patient. The segments could include a Message Header Segment (MSH), description of trigger events (EVN), patient identification (PID) and patient visit information (PV1). Fields could include such items as date (DT), person name (XPN) and address (XAD). And the same pattern works for components and sub-components.
Conformance
Q. What is conformance?
A. Conformance means that an HL7 message adheres to a certain message specification in terms of the number of fields, length of data, constant values and number of repetitions of segments in messages. The procedures in this documentation deal primarily with ensuring conformance to specifications that are expressed as XML “profiles”.
Q. What is being constrained to meet conformance?
A. The following items are being constrained:
- Minimum and maximum repetitions of segments
- Maximum length of data
- Constant values
- Structure
of messages
Q Where can I get more information on conformance?
A. Visit the Web site http://hl7.org. Under the Committees section, click on Special Interest Groups. On the left hand side under Special Interest Groups, click on Conformance.
