HL7 v 3.0 is a little disappointing.

I was disheartened to come across this post which describes other's difficult user experiences with HL7 v. 3.0. For those who do not know, HL7 is a well known protocol that heathcare providers user to interchange data. Ansi X12 is often mentioned in the same breath as HL7, if you're familiar with that one.

Well, the great thing about HL7v3 was that it was going from a character delimited format to XML. That would open it up to all sorts of benefits, such as schema validation, and much better parsing ability.

The (hospital) marketplace has been slow to adopt HL7v3, but software vendors are supporting it. It will only be a matter of time before we have critical mass. I just hope that my experience is better than the one referenced here.

On a positive note, I did email hl7.org about the availability of the open source eclipse plug-ins that are being developed for HL7v3. I received a nice email back from Richard Kavanagh himself (the development manager) indicating that they can be found on the Eclipse OHF site. I continue to watch the OHF and IHE projects with great interest.