Sun Microsystems IP HL 7, TCP About HL7, TheTCP/IP HL7 Adapter Architecture

TheMessage Library handles all of the lower-layer protocol. The Message Library’sbehavior is

customizedusing the Adapter conguration properties. These Adapter properties are used by

theresource adapter, but are also accessed and used by the prebuilt Collaborations.

About HL7

HL7is a standard for exchanging information between medical applications and is an

abbreviationof Health Level Seven. Level Seven refers to the seventh OSI layer protocol for the

healthenvironment. HL7 denes the format and the content of the messages that applications

mustuse when exchanging data with each other under various circumstances.

Hospitalsand other medical institutions typically use many dierent types of systems to

communicatewith one another. Everything, from patient records to billing information, is

trackedand recorded in computer systems. In order for these dierent types of systems to

communicatewith each other, they use a standard like HL7.

Note– In the computer world, a protocol is a formal, well-dened standard for exchanging

informationbetween computer applications.

Animportant part of the HL7 standard is the ACKnowledgment protocol, also known as an

ACK.Every time an application accepts a message and consumes the data, it is expected to send

anACKnowledgment message back to the sending application. The sending application is

expectedto keep on sending a message until it has received an ACK message.

TheTCP/IP HL7 Adapter Architecture

TheTCP/IP HL7 Adapter's functionality comes from a combination of the TCP/IP HL7

ResourceAdapter (RA), the predened inbound and outbound HL7 Collaborations, and the

genericHL7 Message Libraries.

TheTCP/IP HL7 Resource Adapter communicates with external HL7 systems, establishes and

maintainsthe TCP/IP socket, manages message enveloping, maintains the sequence numbering

le,and provides the HL7 protocol state to the Collaboration. The RA (Resource Adapter) is

conguredfrom the Adapter Properties Editor.

Theinbound and outbound HL7 Collaborations provide message validation, sequence

numbering,ACK and NAK generation, and recourse actions. The predened HL7

Collaborationsare designed to implement the HL7 standard protocol and inter-operate with

similarstandard compliant systems by simply changing the Adapter property conguration.

SunAdapterfor TCP/IP HL7 Overview

SunAdapterfor TCP/IP HL7 User's Guide • Oc tober 200910