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8.4 Resource Practitioner - Content

Patient Administration icon Work GroupMaturity Level: 5 Trial UseSecurity Category: Individual Compartments: Practitioner

A person who is directly or indirectly involved in the provisioning of healthcare or related services.

8.4.1 Scope and Usage

Practitioner covers all individuals who are engaged in the healthcare process and healthcare-related services as part of their formal responsibilities and this Resource is used for attribution of activities and responsibilities to these individuals. Practitioners include (but are not limited to):

  • physicians, dentists, pharmacists
  • physician assistants, nurses, scribes
  • midwives, dietitians, therapists, optometrists, paramedics
  • medical technicians, laboratory scientists, prosthetic technicians, radiographers
  • social workers, professional homecare providers, official volunteers
  • receptionists handling patient registration
  • IT personnel merging or unmerging patient records
  • service animal (e.g., ward assigned dog capable of detecting cancer in patients)
  • a bus driver for a community organization
  • a lawyer acting for a hospital or a patient
  • a person working for a supplier of a healthcare organization

The Practitioner resource is used for anyone involved in the provision of care or services to a Patient associated with an organization. The RelatedPerson resource is used for anyone involved in the care for a patient, typically having a personal *relationship *or non-healthcare-specific professional relationship to the patient.

8.4.2 Boundaries and Relationships

The Resource SHALL NOT be used for persons involved without a formal responsibility like individuals taking care for friends, relatives or neighbors. These can be registered as a Patient's Contact. If performing some action or being referenced by another resource, use the RelatedPerson resource.

The primary distinction between a Practitioner and a RelatedPerson is based on whether:

  • The person/animal operates on behalf of the care delivery organization over multiple patients (Practitioner) or,
  • Where the person/animal is not associated with the organization, and instead is allocated tasks specifically for the RelatedPerson's Patient (RelatedPerson).

A standard extension animalSpecies can be used to indicate the species of a service animal.

The PractitionerRole resource provides the details of roles that the practitioner is approved to perform for which organizations (and at which locations, and optionally what services too).

Practitioners are also often grouped into CareTeams independently of roles, where the CareTeam defines what specific role that they are fulfilling within the team, and might or might not have actual practitioner role resources created for the practitioner (and in the care team context, the organization the practitioner is representing)

When an autonomous system or machine is an actor or participant, the Device resource should be used to represent that system. This would include artificial intelligence or machine learning (AI/ML) systems, as well as other automated systems.

8.4.3 Background and Context

Practitioner performs different roles within the same or even different organizations. Depending on jurisdiction and custom, it may be necessary to maintain a specific Practitioner Resource for each such role or have a single Practitioner with multiple roles. The role can be limited to a specific period, after which authorization for this role ends. Note that the represented organization need not necessarily be the (direct) employer of a Practitioner.

8.4.4 References to this Resource

8.4.5 Resource Content

Structure

NameFlagsCard.TypeDescription & Constraintsdoco
.. Practitioner TU DomainResource A person with a formal responsibility in the provisioning of healthcare or related services

Elements defined in Ancestors: id, meta, implicitRules, language, text, contained, extension, modifierExtension
... identifier Σ 0..* Identifier An identifier for the person as this agent

... active ?!Σ 0..1 boolean Whether this practitioner's record is in active use
... name Σ 0..* HumanName The name(s) associated with the practitioner

... gender Σ 0..1 code male | female | other | unknown
Binding: AdministrativeGender (Required)
... birthDate Σ 0..1 date The date on which the practitioner was born
... deceased[x] ?!Σ 0..1 Indicates if the practitioner is deceased or not
.... deceasedBoolean boolean
.... deceasedDateTime dateTime
... address Σ 0..* Address Address(es) of the practitioner that are not role specific (typically home address)

... photo 0..* Attachment Image of the person

... qualification 0..* BackboneElement Qualifications, certifications, accreditations, licenses, training, etc. pertaining to the provision of care

.... identifier 0..* Identifier An identifier for this qualification for the practitioner

.... code 1..1 CodeableConcept Coded representation of the qualification
Binding: hl7VS-degreeLicenseCertificate icon (Example)
.... status 0..1 CodeableConcept Status/progress of the qualification
Binding: Qualification Status (Preferred)
.... period 0..1 Period Period during which the qualification is valid
.... issuer 0..1 Reference(Organization) Organization that regulates and issues the qualification
... communication 0..* BackboneElement A language which may be used to communicate with the practitioner

.... language 1..1 CodeableConcept The language code used to communicate with the practitioner
Binding: All Languages (Required)
Additional BindingsPurpose
Common Languages Starter Set

.... preferred 0..1 boolean Language preference indicator

doco Documentation for this format icon

See the Extensions for this resource

 

Additional definitions: Master Definition XML + JSON, XML Schema/Schematron + JSON Schema, ShEx (for Turtle) + see the extensions, the spreadsheet version & the dependency analysis

8.4.5.1 Terminology Bindings

Path ValueSet Type Documentation
Practitioner.gender AdministrativeGender Required

The gender of a person used for administrative purposes.
Practitioner.qualification.code Hl7VSDegreeLicenseCertificate icon (a valid code from degreeLicenseCertificate icon) Example

Concepts specifying an educational degree (e.g., MD). Used in the CNN datatype (names and identifiers of clinicians) in Version 2 messaging. Used in Version 2 messaging; note that in releases of HL7 prior to 2.3.1, was also used in person names (XPN), but this use was deprecated, then withdrawn in 2.7.
Practitioner.qualification.status QualificationStatus Preferred

Set of statuses that apply to qualifications of practitioners and organizations
Practitioner.communication.language AllLanguages (a valid code from Tags for the Identification of Languages icon) Required

This value set includes all possible codes from BCP-47 (see http://tools.ietf.org/html/bcp47)
  Common Languages starter

8.4.6 Notes:

  • The practitioner's Qualifications are acquired by the practitioner independent of any organization or role, and do not imply that they are allowed/authorized to perform roles relevant to the qualification at any specific Organization/Location.
  • Business idenfitiers may be used in Practitioner.identifier and/or Practitioner.qualification.identifier based on local requirements.
    The Practitioner.identifier doesn't convey anything about the status of the license (other than period), if this or any additional details are available then the qualification.identifier should be used.
    E.g. a specific license includes its type, status, issuer and a local category extension for which specialties were included in the license.

8.4.7 Search Parameters

Search parameters for this resource. See also the full list of search parameters for this resource, and check the Extensions registry for search parameters on extensions related to this resource. The common parameters also apply. See Searching for more information about searching in REST, messaging, and services.

Name Type Description Expression In Common
active token Whether the practitioner record is active Practitioner.active
address string A server defined search that may match any of the string fields in the Address, including line, city, district, state, country, postalCode, and/or text Practitioner.address 4 Resources
address-city string A city specified in an address Practitioner.address.city 4 Resources
address-country string A country specified in an address Practitioner.address.country 4 Resources
address-postalcode string A postalCode specified in an address Practitioner.address.postalCode 4 Resources
address-state string A state specified in an address Practitioner.address.state 4 Resources
address-use token A use code specified in an address Practitioner.address.use 4 Resources
communication token A language to communicate with the practitioner Practitioner.communication.language
death-date date The date of death has been provided and satisfies this search value (Practitioner.deceased.ofType(dateTime))
deceased token This Practitioner has been marked as deceased, or has a death date entered Practitioner.deceased.exists() and Practitioner.deceased != false
email token A value in an email contact Practitioner.telecom.where(system='email') 5 Resources
family string A portion of the family name Practitioner.name.family 2 Resources
gender token Gender of the practitioner Practitioner.gender 4 Resources
given string A portion of the given name Practitioner.name.given 2 Resources
identifier token A practitioner's Identifier Practitioner.identifier | Practitioner.qualification.identifier
name string A server defined search that may match any of the string fields in the HumanName, including family, give, prefix, suffix, suffix, and/or text Practitioner.name
phone token A value in a phone contact Practitioner.telecom.where(system='phone') 5 Resources
phonetic string A portion of either family or given name using some kind of phonetic matching algorithm Practitioner.name 4 Resources
qualification-period date The date(s) a qualification is valid for Practitioner.qualification.period
telecom token The value in any kind of contact Practitioner.telecom 5 Resources