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Use of XML Schema Definition for the Development of Semantically Interoperable Healthcare Applications

  • Conference paper
Book cover Foundations of Health Information Engineering and Systems (FHIES 2013)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNPSE,volume 8315))

Abstract

Multilevel modeling has been proven in software as a viable solution for semantic interoperability, without imposing any specific programming languages or persistence models. The Multilevel Healthcare Information Modeling (MLHIM) specifications have adopted the XML Schema Definition 1.1 as the basis for its reference implementation, since XML technologies are consistent across all platforms and operating systems, with tools available for all mainstream programming languages. In MLHIM, the healthcare knowledge representation is defined by the Domain Model, expressed as Concept Constraint Definitions (CCDs), which provide the semantic interpretation of the objects persisted according to the generic Reference Model classes. This paper reports the implementation of the MLHIM Reference Model in XML Schema Definition language version 1.1 as well as a set of examples of CCDs generated from the National Cancer Institute – Common Data Elements (NCI CDE) repository. The set of CCDs was the base for the simulation of semantically coherent data instances, according to independent XML validators, persisted on an eXistDB database. This paper shows the feasibility of adopting XML technologies for the achievement of semantic interoperability in real healthcare scenarios, by providing application developers with a significant amount of industry experience and a wide array of tools through XML technologies.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Health Information Technology, Medical Sciences College, Rio de Janeiro State University, Brazil

    Luciana Tricai Cavalini

  2. National Institute of Science and Technology –, Medicine Assisted by Scientific Computing, Brazil

    Timothy Wayne Cook

Authors
  1. Luciana Tricai Cavalini
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  2. Timothy Wayne Cook
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Computer Science, Oxford University, Wolfson Building, Parks Road, OX1 3QD, Oxford, UK

    Jeremy Gibbons

  2. Department of Mathematics, St. Francis Xavier University, P.O. Box 5000, B2G 2W5, Antigonish, NS, Canada

    Wendy MacCaull

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Cavalini, L.T., Cook, T.W. (2014). Use of XML Schema Definition for the Development of Semantically Interoperable Healthcare Applications. In: Gibbons, J., MacCaull, W. (eds) Foundations of Health Information Engineering and Systems. FHIES 2013. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 8315. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-53956-5_9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-53956-5_9

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-53955-8

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-53956-5

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

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