Investigations and documents

Communicare receives pathology and imaging results, letters and other documents electronically and sends documents and letters electronically using HL7 messages.

Incoming documents

Communicare supports the following incoming documents with embedded data.

Table 1. Supported incoming document formats
Format	Description	Location	Further information
HL7 (ORU): HL7 (ORU) + PDF HL7 (ORU) + formatted text (FT) HL7 (ORU) + plain text HL7 (ORU) PIT HL7 (ORU) + HTML*	For incoming results. Coded qualifiers such as HBa1C, HDL, LDL are added to the corresponding qualifier fields in Communicare automatically (if the OBX lines are coded).	Detail > Ix Results tab	Communicare supports HL7 2.3
HL7 (MDM) + CDA HL7 (REF) + PDF	For incoming letters and documents.	Detail > Document tab	Communicare supports: HL7 V2.3.1 MDM message with CDA document HL7 V2.4 REF message with PDF document Tip: If incoming letters or documents are listed on the Ix Results tab, ask the sender to send documents in either of these formats instead of as HL7 ORU files.
PIT (PIT)	Communicare still accepts PIT, however, coded qualifiers such as HBa1C, HDL, LDL, are not automatically added to the qualifier fields in Communicare and are not included in the qualifier summary, reports and graphs unless added manually to the patient's clinical record.	Detail > Ix Results tab	Ask your lab to return HL7 (ORU) with embedded PIT instead. If you are using Medical-Objects for receiving documents and results, you will only be able to receive PIT (PIT) files and will not be able to receive HL7 (ORU) files. Communicare is collaborating with Medical-Objects to resolve HL7 (ORU) compatibility problems. Communicate requires that PIT files are encoded with UTF-8.

Outgoing documents

Communicare sends outgoing letters as PDFs using HL7 V2.4 REF_I12 message format. This includes referrals and discharge summaries using the letter format.

CDA eReferrals and discharge summaries cannot be sent via secure messaging at this time.