Glossary
HL7
A family of standards for exchanging health information between systems, and the organization that publishes them.
What is HL7?
HL7 stands for Health Level Seven. It is both a standards organization, HL7 International, and the family of standards it publishes for sharing health information between computer systems.
HL7 version 2
HL7 v2 is the most widely used version in labs and hospitals. A v2 message is plain text split into segments, one per line, with fields separated by the pipe character (|). Common segments include:
- MSH: message header, with the sender, receiver and message type.
- PID: patient identification.
- OBR: the order or test request.
- OBX: a single result, including its value, units, reference range and abnormal flag.
Labs use HL7 v2 to receive orders from clinics and send results back, and some analyzers and middleware use it too.
HL7 FHIR
FHIR (Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources) is a newer HL7 standard built on modern web technology. It is growing fast, especially for patient apps and data sharing, but v2 is still common for lab interfaces.
How Lab Desk handles it
Lab Desk's instrument connection links analyzers using HL7 v2 or ASTM LIS2-A2, with CSV file import as a fallback. Results are mapped to your test catalog and wait in a review queue before release. See orders and results and integrations.
Related terms
- ASTM LIS2-A2: A standard for how clinical analyzers and lab software exchange orders and results.
- LIS (laboratory information system): Software that manages a clinical lab's orders, specimens, results and reports.
- Abnormal flag: A marker such as H or L that shows a result falls above or below the reference range.
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