SNOMED CT Implementation Guide for the Nutrition Care Process Terminology

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History

To facilitate the development of nutrition-related content in SNOMED CT, the NCPT Clinical Project Group was established, bringing together nutrition and dietetics professionals across several continents. This group played a pivotal role in reviewing, validating, and authoring content directly into the SNOMED CT International Release with support from SNOMED International authors. The work of the project group, which took place between 2017 and 2024, culminated in the integration of NCPT (Nutrition Care Process Terminology, Edition 2020) into SNOMED CT. With the integration complete, the NCPT Clinical Project Group concluded its efforts.

The responsibility for maintaining nutrition and dietetics content within SNOMED CT has since transitioned to the Nutrition and Dietetics Clinical Resource Group (CPRG). This group is now tasked with overseeing the management of nutrition-related concepts, maintaining the reference set, and leading quality improvement projects in collaboration with SNOMED International. The Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics continues to provide stewardship through dedicated staff support.

Benefits of SNOMED CT 

When clinical concepts are modeled using a set of rules (these rules are explained in the SNOMED CT Editorial Guide), this allows for consistent representation of clinical information in electronic health records (EHRs). Thus, good modeling enhances the quality of the data. Also, modeling of concepts offers the necessary infrastructure to carry out data analytics, collapse, or parse different sets of data. This means that data can be analyzed with different levels of granularity, across different settings, and reused by many for different objectives. (for more information on data analysis with SNOMED CT, please refer to: Data Analytics with SNOMED CT and Data Analytics Tooling)

Key Benefits of High-Quality Clinical Concept Modeling

High-quality modeling of clinical concepts is crucial for ensuring data quality and maximizing the utility of health information. Effective modeling supports the automation of processes and the generation of knowledge at various levels, from individual healthcare services to institutional, regional, national, and international systems.

  • Population Analytics: With SNOMED CT, healthcare organizations can analyze population data to identify patterns and trends across patient groups. This enables the detection of shifts in the prevalence of clinical issues (such as nutrition-related problems), procedures, and interventions over time, helping to inform public health initiatives, resource allocation, and policy development.
  • Clinical Decision Support Systems: SNOMED CT serves as a foundation for clinical decision support, enabling systems to provide timely, evidence-based recommendations. By standardizing data, it also facilitates accurate laboratory reporting and registry tracking and reporting, improving the precision and consistency of clinical decision-making and documentation.
  • Removing Language Barriers: SNOMED CT supports multilingual use, allowing healthcare data to be shared and understood across language divides. This is especially valuable in diverse or multilingual regions, as it enables healthcare providers to communicate consistently and accurately regardless of language.

By modeling clinical concepts with precision, SNOMED CT not only enhances data quality but also empowers healthcare systems to harness data for deeper insights, improved decision-making, and more equitable, coordinated care globally.

SNOMED CT Content for NCPT

This chapter provides a comprehensive overview of SNOMED CT content specific to the Nutrition Care Process Terminology (NCPT). The objective of the following sections is to explain how SNOMED CT concepts relevant to the Nutrition Care Process (NCP) are modeled within the SNOMED CT framework.

It is important to note that there is no single, unified hierarchy dedicated solely to “nutrition content” within SNOMED CT. Instead, relevant content is distributed across various sub-hierarchies according to broader domains, such as Procedures, Clinical Findings, and others. This division ensures that nutrition-related concepts are aligned with the overarching structure of SNOMED CT while remaining accessible within the appropriate contexts.

To aid understanding and interpretation, each page of this chapter will introduce relevant content, along with explanations of its modeling approach, attributes, and examples. This layout is designed to help readers navigate and utilize SNOMED CT content for NCP effectively, with practical examples that demonstrate the structure and utility of each concept within clinical documentation and workflows.


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