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Care contexts

A Care Context represents a logical grouping of a patient's health records. Each HMIS/LMIS system should define how patient data is organised into one or more care contexts in a meaningful and consistent way.

A care context serves as the unit that is associated with a patient's ABHA address within the system.

Key design principles​

The HIE-CM (Health Information Exchange & Consent Manager) is designed to be data-blind.

  • This means it does not access or store the actual health record content.
  • Instead, it only works with identifiers and metadata related to care contexts.

Components of a care context​

Each care context contains only two pieces of information:

  • Reference ID. A unique internal identifier assigned by the HRP (HMIS/LMIS). Used to link and retrieve the associated health records.
  • Display Name. A user-friendly description to help identify the group of records. Must not include any sensitive or confidential information such as test results or diagnoses. Example: "OPD records (X-Ray, Prescription) from 3rd March 2023".

To ensure clarity and usability, it is recommended to organise patient data as follows:

  • Create one care context per outpatient visit (OPD)
  • Create one care context per inpatient admission (IPD)

This approach provides a clear and event-based grouping of health records.

JSON structure of care contexts​

{
  "patient": {
    "referenceNumber": "TMH-PUID-001",
    "display": "TMH records for Kiran Kumar",
    "careContexts": [
      {
        "referenceNumber": "2375639",
        "display": "OPD records for O3 Oct 2022"
      }
    ]
  }
}

Next steps​

  • Linking, how a care context reaches the patient's ABHA address.
  • M2 Attach, the milestone that links care contexts and shares the records in them.
  • M2 API reference, the calls that carry a care context.
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