Unspecified Part Numbers

Decision Status: Completed

Background

LOINC does not explicitly document the part number for unspecified part values on their website. They leave it blank or sometimes put "{..}" to show it is unspecified.

Options

1. Continue to follow the LOINC syntax and incomplete specification of values.
2. Establish a Canadian way of displaying unspecified Part values

Discussion

It is clearer, particularly for machine-readable files, to avoid blank or Null values. If there is a part number that clearly indicates the value is unspecified, then it should be used as it's more specific. Ontario LOINC ontology uses numbers in unspecified part value fields.

Decision

Votes:

• ML:5
• DL:5
• DO:3
• NS:3
• DS:5
• DC:5

Guideline

Unspecified part numbers will use the LOINC numeric code for unspecified part numbers.