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World Health Organization

World Health Organization

Standards Partner

SNOMED International and WHO have experienced a formal collaborative relationship since 2010 when they first entered into a ground-breaking collaborative arrangement that would change the relationship between the two organizations and their respective standards, by enabling users of SNOMED CT to use WHO classifications jointly and interoperably.

Additional information

The initial focus was on creating a map between SNOMED CT and  ICD-10 for global use, taking into account the editorial guidance of both products.  The agreement also set out a framework for linking SNOMED CT and ICD-11 so that users who had licenses for both would benefit and over a number of years work was undertaken to develop a methodology for creating this linkage.


As WHO focused on delivering ICD-11 Morbidity and Mortality Statistics (MMS), the collaboration work focused on ensuring alignment between SNOMED CT and ICD-11 MMS to facilitate based on implementation targets set by the World Health Assembly for ICD-11 MMS, with SNOMED International members identifing their first priority to be the production of a map from SNOMED CT to ICD-11 MMS. An initial automated map has been produced by SNOMED International and is currently available for review.


SNOMED International and WHO remain committed to the overall goal of the original arrangement and are working on developing new ways of moving forward providing a linkage between SNOMED CT and ICD-11. Further information will be available once the collaborative arrangement has been formally revised and mutually agreed by both organizations, with a direction for the collaborative work.

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