What is the NHS Scotland Terminology Server?
Scotland’s Terminology Server is a centralised resource for managing and accessing clinical terminologies and classifications, ensuring consistency in healthcare data exchange across systems.
The NHS Scotland Terminology Server is a vital component in delivering standardised, accurate, and interoperable clinical data across the healthcare landscape in Scotland.
Implemented as part of the SNOMED CT Implementation Programme, it provides a centralised platform for managing healthcare terminologies such as SNOMED CT, ICD-10, and dm+d, enabling health professionals to access consistent data for better decision-making, improved patient safety, and efficient healthcare delivery.
Supporting Integration
The NHS Scotland Terminology Server is based on Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources (FHIR) standards, making it fully compliant with international standards for healthcare data exchange. This ensures that the server can support secure and scalable communication across healthcare systems, promoting data interoperability throughout NHSScotland.
Goals of The Terminology Server
- Streamline healthcare communication through unified access to medical terminologies.
- Enhance the accuracy and efficiency of clinical coding and data management.
- Facilitate integration and interoperability across Scotland’s healthcare system.
The NHS Scotland Terminology Server is a enabler of interoperable healthcare in Scotland, supporting the national drive towards standardised clinical data through SNOMED CT. By facilitating the integration of healthcare terminologies, the server helps to deliver safer, more efficient, and patient-centered care, aligning with the following strategies, Greater Access, Better Insight, Improved outcomes: A Strategy for Data-Driven Care in The Digital Age and Enabling Connecting and Empowering Care in the Digital Age.
How it can be used
The Terminology Server provides functionality to support organisations developing their capability within digital systems in relation to SNOMED CT, as well as providing APIs to other terminology and classification content such as ICD-10.
The Terminology Server provides functionality such as:
- Access to updates: Updates to the latest release(s) of content, enabling organisations to align their own content from a single source.
- Smart data entry: for example of SNOMED terms through an intelligent browser enabling systems to support users entering terms in SNOMED in a live application.
- Subset creation: functionality that helps with the creation of subsets of content; in particular for SNOMED CT subsets the server supports writing a query to identify required terms.
- Mapping tables: the server has functionality to support mapping from local terms to national terms, as well as then hosting and providing live access to the final mapping table.
- Artefact maintenance: Functionality to support the maintenance of an organisation’s SNOMED CT subsets (e.g. by managing inactive content and identifying new concepts/descriptions).
- Analytics: providing functionality to support those writing queries, for example what are all the SNOMED CT concept Ids that are a descendant of a particular concept.
- Clinical Coding: Standardise and streamline clinical coding processes.
- Data Integration: Support seamless integration of data across various healthcare systems.
- Terminology Management: Provide tools for managing healthcare terminologies effectively.
Who can use it
The NHS Scotland Terminology Server is available free of charge to any organisation providing services to the NHS in Scotland. This includes, but is not limited to:
- Healthcare professionals requiring access to standarised terminologies.
- IT system developers integrating healthcare systems.
- Administrators managing clinical data systems.
- Providers of health and care services
- Commissioners of health and care services
- Population health managers
- Suppliers in the health and care market
- Researchers and analysts
Content included on the Terminology Server
- SNOMED CT – current release and a number of historical releases.
- Human Phenotype Ontology (HPO) (20201207)
- ICD-10 – including historical versions (2017 – 2020)
- OPCS-4 – (4.8 and 4.9)
- READ codes (4 byte, V2 and CTV3) – including historical versions (2009 – 2018)
- UCUM (Unified Code for Units of Measure) (2.1)
- FHIR – including all published CodeSystems, ValueSets and ConceptMaps
- dm+d – including historical versions
How to get Access
Read Only Access
Users with an NHS Scotland email address, GitHub account or Google account are able to access the content on the Terminology server and can do so from here.
Other Access
If you do not have one of the above accounts, wish to have authoring access or you require access to the server from a software application, please contact the SNOMED CT Implementation team at nss.snomed@nhs.scot
Contact us
If you require any further information on the Terminology Server please contact the SNOMED CT Implementation team at nss.snomed@nhs.scot