Invitation to contribute specialist expertise to SNOMED CT terminology development
LabMed has been invited to help identify laboratory professionals who can provide specialist input to the further development and validation of SNOMED CT terminology for laboratory diagnostics and patient test results.
The request comes from NHS England and the Department of Health and Social Care, recognising the need for professional input to ensure that the coding structures used for laboratory testing accurately reflect clinical practice. Ideally, contributions will come from people already working in laboratory informatics and related areas across networks and health boards, bringing practical experience of how laboratory data is coded, reported and used.
This work is particularly important given the scale of laboratory data within the NHS. Around 1.4 billion laboratory test result codes are sent from laboratories to GP systems each year, representing approximately 35% of all coded patient data. The move from legacy Read Codes towards SNOMED CT and FHIR-based messaging is intended to improve the quality, consistency and interoperability of this information.
Specialist laboratory input will help ensure that SNOMED CT concepts are clinically accurate, semantically precise and aligned with current laboratory workflows. This includes reviewing concepts across clinical chemistry, haematology, microbiology, immunology and transfusion medicine, identifying terminology that is missing or ambiguous, and ensuring that clinically important distinctions are represented appropriately.
There is also an opportunity for specialists to contribute to the mapping of local and legacy codes used in laboratory information management systems and middleware to SNOMED CT PaLM, as well as supporting implementation and assurance work where required.
For laboratory professionals working in this area, taking part provides an opportunity to bring their expertise into a national piece of work that will influence how laboratory results are represented and exchanged across NHS systems. Better-standardised laboratory data can support more consistent reporting, clinical decision-making and patient safety, as well as its use in research, analytics, genomics, public health and patient-facing services such as the NHS App.
Contributions will be made through the Pathology and Laboratory Medicine (PaLM) Informatics Expert Reference Group (ERG), which provides a forum for discussing terminology validation, clinical relevance and mapping strategy. Participation is voluntary, with individual contributions also welcomed from specialists who are unable to commit to regular involvement.
LabMed is helping to share this opportunity with its members and encourage those with relevant expertise to consider getting involved. Specialists interested in contributing are asked to contact [email protected].