Outcomes from Community Comment Period

The Australian Core Data for Interoperability (AUCDI) Release 1 Draft for Community Comment

The AUCDI aims to standardise the capture, structure, usage, and exchange of health data to counteract the current fragmentation of Australia’s health data systems. This initiative is pivotal in enhancing patient care, promoting clinical safety, improving clinical decision-making, and facilitating seamless health information exchange.

Scope of Release 1

The scope of AUCDI R1 is a subset of the International Patient Summary and some encounter information. It is intended that the scope will expand in further iterations of the AUCDI.

The scope of AUCDI R1 includes:

• Problem/Diagnosis,
• Adverse reaction risk (allergies and intolerances),
• Medications,
• Procedures,
• Vaccinations (immunisations),
• Vital signs, measurements and other biomarkers for chronic disease and preventative health with an initial scope of cardiovascular risk calculation and diabetes care, and
• Encounter information that are required to give clinical context.

Draft AUCDI R1 was open for feedback until Friday 8 March 2024.
The community comment period has now closed.

Review of AUCDI Release 1

Sparked is seeking feedback on the following areas:

1. Suggestions for improvement in the data groups or elements in Draft AUCDI R1 including: Data groups and data element definitions and examples of code sets used by vendors and implementers to communicate data element scope
   1. is the clinical content is correct e.g. data element names and descriptions,
   2. is the metadata is appropriate e.g. use and misuse
   3. is there anything missing or inappropriate?
   4. are there issues with the use of terminology (code system and value set) of the data elements
2. Suggestions for additional data elements that are not yet in the backlog and why?
3. Are there significant barriers to development, implementation, or use for any of these data elements in Draft AUCDI R1 that warrant a change in definition, or removal?
4. Suggestions around additional use cases and data groups/elements to support those use cases to go on our roadmap
5. General feedback on the document including
   • additional references
   • additional information to provide greater clarity or context around the AUCDI and its use
   • additional national standards and initiatives we should be considering

Feedback guidelines

• For changes and new content requests to the AUCDI content, please provide clear justification, use cases and references – providing more detail will assist the Sparked team in understanding the nature and context of your requirements. The justification will also aid in assessing the risks and benefits that are associated with making the change.
  • If there are similar data elements available already, please provide justification why a new suggested data element is required and the use cases that it supports
• For each data group, please provide an overall recommendation
  • If your answer is “Major revision” or “Reject” , please make sure you let us know why in the feedback sections

Sparked welcomes information that identifies the healthcare community’s preferences and priorities for informing further investigation.

Target audience of review: Reviews are accepted from all interested stakeholders. Digital health or clinical expertise is not required to provide comments – we encourage contributions from all unique points of view as the collaborative review process in intended to be inclusive of all points of view and not requiring specific skill sets or professional background.

Reviewers Guidelines

We are sincerely grateful to everyone who gives their time to review the draft materials we publish. This process is the cornerstone of our collaborative, community-based approach.

The Sparked Team

We ask reviewers to:

• Read all material first prior to commencing the review – your questions may be answered by subsequent sections
• Provide constructive, actionable feedback on the content – we are looking to harness your consumer, clinical and technical expertise and experience throughout this review, we will go through the formatting and grammar with a fine tooth comb prior to finalisation of the draft. Please maintain a neutral tone and focus on providing constructive comments to help us enhance the draft.
• Submit all feedback by the closure date – if you require additional time to complete your review, please email us at fhir@csiro.au
• Share the Sparked program and this page to your network – we want this review to go far and wide
• Provide specific feedback via the Forms tool  – if you have specific feedback on each of the sections, it is best to submit your comments through the Forms tool and be as detailed as possible.
• Provide general feedback via email – if your comments are more general in nature, you can still submit these via the form or if it doesn’t fit the form you can email them directly to us using fhir@csiro.au
• Engage with the Sparked program – as we develop these deliverables and the Sparked program more generally, let us know what you would like to see more of or what you think could be beneficial. Get involved with the Sparked program by registering your interest, by joining the Clinical Design Group or the Technical Design, or by attending Sparked events.

After the close of the review period, we will work through to classify and action the feedback received from reviewers. Once Release 1 has been updated, the outcome of the review will be shared with the Clinical Design Group.

How to review & provide comments

Review and prepare

The AUCDI R1 content is published as a PDF. Please take the time to review the document, and share with others in your organisation if submitting feedback on behalf of your organisation.

We have also provided a PDF prep worksheet – to help you prepare responses prior to accessing the digital form. This worksheet is a PDF version of all the questions featured in the digital form. Not all questions are mandatory, and if you select not to answer for a particular data group, then the subsequent questions about that data group will be skipped over.

If you have any trouble accessing either of these PDFs or the form, please email us at fhir@csiro.au. 

Provide feedback

We have created a digital feedback form for you or your organisation to submit your feedback and comments. You are able to save your responses in the form as your progress through. However, we do suggest using the PDF prep worksheet to store your answers just in case.

The feedback questions follow the same pattern for each data group –

1. Opportunity to provide general feedback (e.g., additional references, additional information to provide greater clarity or context around the AUCDI and its use, additional national standards and initiatives we should be considering)
2. Opportunity to provide specific feedback (e.g., issues, questions, comments, or feedback on a specific data element that needs to be considered or addressed)
3. Overall recommendation

At the end of the section for each data group, you will be asked to provide an overall recommendation for that component:

• Accept – if you have no suggestion for further improvement and consider the data group ready for publication without further review or if the suggested changes are trivial (e.g., spelling)
• Minor revision – if you consider that there are only small changes required to make the data group ready for publication
• Major revision – if you consider the data group needs large or significant modifications such as addition/removal of data elements
• Reject – if you consider the data group is not suitable for publication – for example that it is “unfit for purpose” or fundamentally flawed
• Abstain – if you feel you need to deliberately refrain from participating in the recommendation process. We encourage you to contribute from your unique point of view as the collaborative review process is intended to be inclusive of all points of view and not requiring specific skill sets or professional background.

Documents

Frequently Asked Questions