The goal of the ASSESS CT report, released in early 2017, was to make a significant contribution to the debate on eHealth semantic interoperability in Europe. The substantial analysis and research invested by ASSESS CT has identified SNOMED CT the core reference terminology for EU-wide deployment; a significant piece of the puzzle needed to accomplish eHealth interoperability.

SNOMED International recognizes ASSESS CT for its leadership throughout this initiative and welcomes further collaboration opportunities to support achievement of semantic interoperability across Europe, and globally. Please see the SNOMED International Response linked below for more information.

The 5 recommendations include:

Any decision about the adoption and role of terminological resources, including SNOMED CT, must be part of a wider, coherent and priority driven strategy for optimising the benefits of semantic interoperability. in health data, and of the overarching eHealth strategy of the European Union and its Member States.

SNOMED CT is the best available core reference terminology for crossborder, national and regional eHealth deployments in Europe.

SNOMED CT should be part of an ecosystem of terminologies, including international aggregation terminologies (e.g., the WHO Family of Classifications), and user interface terminologies, which address multilingualism in Europe and clinical communication with multidisciplinary professional language and lay language.

The adoption of SNOMED CT should be realised incrementally rather than all at once, by developing terminology subsets that address the interoperability requirements for priority use cases and expanding these sets over a number of years.

Mechanisms should be established to facilitate and coordinate European Member State cooperation on terminology and semantic interoperability, including common areas of governance across national terminology centres, eHealth competence centres (or equivalent national bodies).