Country / Region
EMEA
Tags
Implementation, Mapping, Research
The German Oncological Core Dataset (named "Onkologischer Basisdatensatz" in German or short: oBDS) is used across Germany 15 regional cancer registries to collect structured data. However, no health IT standards‚ neither syntactic nor semantic‚is used in the oBDS. We present lessons learned from a feasibility study aiming to standardize the oBDS using SNOMED CT, a globally recognized, polyhierarchical medical terminology. An interdisciplinary team mapped independently 554 oBDS elements organized in 19 modules to SNOMED CT and assessed the consistency and quality of these mappings using statistical measures such as Krippendorff's Alpha and ISO scores, while also documenting concepts that could not be represented. The findings indicate that SNOMED CT is fundamentally suitable for the semantic standardization of oBDS, though certain context-specific challenges persist. The study underscores the need for further harmonization, especially through targeted expansion of SNOMED CT to better support oncological registry data and highlights that standardized terminologies can enhance data quality and interoperability in cancer registration and research.
Description
The German Oncological Core Dataset (“Onkologischer Basisdatensatz” short: oBDS) is used in Germany for the structured collection of cancer registry data across all regional cancer registries. This feasibility study analyzes the overall coverage of SNOMED concepts and evaluates current state of SNOMED CT precoordinated concepts as a potential candidate for international and interoperability, as well as providing the German National Release Center with specific suggestions for needed concepts and translations.
Scope
SNOMED CT is a polyhierarchy covering a large spectrum of clinical concepts such as diagnoses, procedures, side effect symptoms, body structures etc. As there are already many national translations available and used among the European countries, it is likely a candidate for an overarching terminology to be used in the European Health data space. A future exchange of health data will likely be realized via the HL7 FHIR Exchange Standard. However, SNOMED CT concepts can be used for semantic annotation of clinical ressources or for defining specific ValueSets.
How SNOMED CT will be used
Data elements of the oBDS data responses were mapped to SNOMED CT by four individual mappers using only precoordinated concepts; Mapping with post-coordinated concepts is planned in future iterations. Individual mapping quality was assessed using ISO Scoring. In addition, mapping heterogenity was assessed via intercoder agreement, comparing a classical Krippendorff's alpha approach with a semantically weighted Krippendorff's alpha, using a similarity matrix of SNOMED CT graph distances of two concepts as foundation for a similarity analysis.
Why SNOMED CT will be used
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