SNOMED International is pleased to announce the publication of the SNOMED CT Template Syntax v1.0. The Template Syntax presents the formal rules for representing slots in SNOMED CT expressions, expression constraints and queries. A slot represents a constraint and/or a placeholder for a value that is not known at the time of authoring, but which can be completed at a later time.

The SNOMED CT Template Syntax may be used in conjunction with any of the computable SNOMED CT languages to represent templates of various kinds in a consistent way. For example, the Template Syntax can be used with SNOMED CT Compositional Grammar to create the SNOMED CT Expression Template Language. The Expression Template Language v1.0 incorporates the latest version of the SNOMED CT Expression Constraint Language (v1.3) to restrict the valid values that may be used to populate a slot. Expression templates can be used to support a variety of use cases, including the authoring of concepts and the creation of patterns for post coordination.

For more information, please refer to http://snomed.org/sts, http://snomed.org/etl and http://snomed.org/ecl or contact info@snomed.org