INDIANAPOLIS -- The National Library of Medicine has awarded Regenstrief Institute a five-year, $5 million contract extension to ensure the continued maintenance, expansion and public distribution of LOINC®, a global standard for health terminology. The NLM issued its initial contract to support the creation and development of LOINC in 1999. With this extension, NLM's commitment to LOINC will reach 30 years by the time the award expires in 2029.
“The NLM’s continued support of LOINC demonstrates the value the standard delivers to patients, care providers, health officials and researchers worldwide, an impact that has endured for decades,” said Marjorie Rallins, DPM, M.S., executive director of Regenstrief Institute’s Health Data Standards, which oversees LOINC. “This extension helps to sustain the stability, growth and wide availability of this vital resource.”
LOINC, short for Logical Observation Identifiers Names and Codes, is an international standard for identifying health measurements, observations and documents that is available by royalty free license. The terminology creates a common language for healthcare data, enabling a seamless exchange of information for better care, research and outcomes management. With more than 102,000 terms used globally, LOINC is a cornerstone of healthcare interoperability. The nomenclature marked its 30th anniversary in 2024.
LOINC-SNOMED Ontology
To increase interoperability of standardized terminology, Regenstrief and SNOMED International created The LOINC Ontology: A LOINC and SNOMED CT interoperability solution, which was unveiled in 2024. The partnership supports providers and users who implement different combinations of SNOMED CT and LOINC in health information systems and allows them to meet clinical and regulatory requirements in a single solution. Linked in a complementary way, SNOMED CT provides the computable framework and LOINC provides laboratory and pathology content in an understood format to countries who do not currently use LOINC.
Expansion of SDOH in EHRs
In addition to support from NLM and other government agencies, LOINC received a four-year, $4.4 million award from the Regenstrief Foundation that was announced in December of 2023. The funding is supporting expansion of work on a global initiative to categorize and standardize social determinants of health (SDOH) information into electronic health records (EHRs), an ambitious project to integrate social needs data into clinical care to more effectively address health inequities. The project is being led by Health Data Standards at Regenstrief and Health Level Seven® (HL7®) International’s Gravity Project, which has been named in a White House report, The U.S. Playbook to Address Social Determinants of Health, as the recognized source for nationally required SDOH data elements.
Biannual concepts release
Regenstrief Health Data Standards is charged with evaluating and updating LOINC terminology in cooperation with professionals from around the world who use LOINC. Collaboration also has included U.S. federal agencies such as the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the National Council for Prescription Drug Programs and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. New releases of LOINC are issued twice a year.
Curation of the biannual LOINC releases includes evaluating concept requests and edits, ensuring thorough quality review measures and completing technical tooling to support the addition of new content to the database and search applications. Additionally, processes and policies are rigorously reviewed and adapted as needed. Recent updates have included supporting interoperability for prescription drug records, gender harmony, disability content and standardizing social risk screening tools for social determinants of health.
Education sessions are conducted twice a year to answer questions and assist with implementation. An annual conference each fall further explores forward-thinking initiatives. The education sessions and annual conference draw international audiences.
To learn more, visit https://loinc.org/ or register for the annual LOINC conference, taking place September 17-20, 2024 in Washington, D.C.
About LOINC®
LOINC was created in 1994 at Regenstrief Institute to facilitate interoperability in healthcare. Today, LOINC contains more than 102,000 terms for everything from a serum alpha 1 antitrypsin level to a zygomatic arch x-ray report. For each concept, LOINC covers many other rich details, such as synonyms, units of measure and carefully crafted descriptions. With long-term funding support from U.S. federal agencies and other organizations, LOINC is available under a royalty free license.