Redwood MedNet :: Glossary

AAFP - The American Academy of Family Physicians is a medical specialty society that represents 90,000 physicians and medical students. The Mission of the AAFP is to improve the health of patients, families and communities by serving the needs of members with professionalism and creativity. See CCR

AANP - American Academy of Nurse Practitioners

AAP - American Academy of Pediatrics

ACA - Affordable Care Act. See PPACA

Acceptance Testing - A formal quality assurance process that allows users to impose standard performance tests on a newly delivered software or computer system prior to production use of the system. See Unit Test

Access Control - Hardware, software or operating policies that control access to facilities, computer devices and computerized systems (from an individual program to a network). See Authentication, Authorization

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Access Point - Common term for radio transceiver for wireless LAN access, also known as a wi-fi base station. See LAN, Wi-Fi

ACC - American College of Cardiology

Acute Care - Short term medical treatment, usually in a hospital. See Ambulatory Care

ADA - American Dental Association

ADT - Admission-Discharge-Transfer, the transactional data set, typically in a hospital information system, that maintains and updates the patient census by noting the time and date of each transition in patient status or location.

Admission - The process of a patient being admitted to a hospital.

Adverse Event - An adverse event is an injury caused by medical management, rather than by the underlying condition of the patient.

Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality - See AHRQ

Agent - Computer software programmed to automate a specific task, such as searching for specific information in a data rich environment.

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Aggregated Data - A set of data compiled for activities such as Public Health or clinical research. Aggregated data sets are typically intended to be unidentifiable at the level of an individual person, however the recent appearance of massively popular social networking sites on the internet has been shown to enable reidentification of individuals in data sets previously assumed to be de-identified. See De-identified Data, Re-identified Data

AHA - American Hospital Association

AHIC - American Health Information Community, formerly a 17 member federal advisory body assembled in 2005 to make recommendations to the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) on how to accelerate the development and adoption of health information technology. Disbanded in 2008, and succeeded by the National eHealth Collaborative. See HHS, NeHC, ONC

AHIMA - American Health Information Management Association

AHIP - America's Health Insurance Plans

AHLTA - The Armed forces Health Longitudinal Technology Application. See CHCS

AHRQ - The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality is major division in the U. S. Department of Health and Human Services. The mission of AHRQ is to improve the quality, safety, efficiency, and effectiveness of health care for all Americans. See HHS

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AIRA - American Immunization Registry Association, publisher of the Implementation Guilde for Immunization Messaging for HL7 v2.5.1. See HL7, CVX, MVX, QDP, VXU

Ajax - Acronym for a combination of technologies, classic Ajax includes asynchronous JavaScript and XML. See JavaScript, REST, XML

Algorithm - A method of problem solving in which instructions are followed in a (usually) specific sequence. Algorithms may involve numeric calculation. See Care Pathway, Expert System, Guideline, Inference Engine, Protocol

AMA - American Medical Association See CPT

AMIA - American Medical Informatics Association, a national member society of IMIA. See IMIA, Informatics

ANA - American Nurses Association

Analog - An analog signal is continuous in time and amplitude, as opposed to a digital signal, which is discrete. Legacy voice grade phone systems, sometimes called Plain Old Telephone Service (POTS), use analog circuits. See Broadband, Dialup, Digital, POTS, Signal, VoIP

ANSI - The American National Standards Institute is the U.S. member body to the ISO. ANSI does not write standards; rather the Institute accredits standards developers that will establish consensus among qualified groups. See HITSP, ISO

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Answering Machine - A simple analog or digital device to record messages on a telephone. See Voice Mail

APA - American Psychological Association

APHA - American Public Health Association

APHL - Association of Public Health Laboratories

API - Application program interface

Application - Computer program that carries out a specific task, such as a "word processing application" or an LIS or EHR. See EHR, LIS

ARRA - The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, a $787 billion stimulus measure signed into law by President Obama on February 17, 2009. A portion of the law provides funding for aggressive health IT spending. See Cal eConnect, CalHIPSO, HITECH, REC, SDE

ASP - Application Service Provider, a type of Client-Server installation where a business hosts computer-based services for customers to access across a network, such as EHR or PMS solutions accessed over the Internet. See Client-Server, EHR, PMS, SaaS

ASTHO - Association of State and Territorial Health Officials is a non-profit membership association representing the chiefs of state and territorial health agencies. See CDC, CDPH, WHO

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ASTM - American Society for Testing and Materials began as a domestic engineering standards body and recently evolved into an international standards organization (ISO). See CCR, ISO

Audit Logs - Records created by hardware (servers, routers, firewalls, etc.) or software (data bases, network systems, individual applications, etc.) that track when data are created, modified, transmitted or destroyed, including the identity of the user initiating the action.

Authentication - The physical or process method or methods employed to prove that the person or entity seeking access to information has the proper authorization. Generally used to protect confidential information by limiting access to computer systems to authorized users. Passwords are an example of a commonly employed authentication process. See Access Control, Authorization, Certificate Authority, Non-Repudiation

Authorization - A system established to grant access to generally confidential information. Authorization generally establishes the level of access an individual or entity has to data based on the identity established by an authentication process. See Access Control, Authentication


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	Health Informatics Glossary A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z AAFP - The American Academy of Family Physicians is a medical specialty society that represents 90,000 physicians and medical students. The Mission of the AAFP is to improve the health of patients, families and communities by serving the needs of members with professionalism and creativity. See CCR AANP - American Academy of Nurse Practitioners AAP - American Academy of Pediatrics ACA - Affordable Care Act. See PPACA Acceptance Testing - A formal quality assurance process that allows users to impose standard performance tests on a newly delivered software or computer system prior to production use of the system. See Unit Test Access Control - Hardware, software or operating policies that control access to facilities, computer devices and computerized systems (from an individual program to a network). See Authentication, Authorization top Access Point - Common term for radio transceiver for wireless LAN access, also known as a wi-fi base station. See LAN, Wi-Fi ACC - American College of Cardiology Acute Care - Short term medical treatment, usually in a hospital. See Ambulatory Care ADA - American Dental Association ADT - Admission-Discharge-Transfer, the transactional data set, typically in a hospital information system, that maintains and updates the patient census by noting the time and date of each transition in patient status or location. Admission - The process of a patient being admitted to a hospital. Adverse Event - An adverse event is an injury caused by medical management, rather than by the underlying condition of the patient. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality - See AHRQ Agent - Computer software programmed to automate a specific task, such as searching for specific information in a data rich environment. top Aggregated Data - A set of data compiled for activities such as Public Health or clinical research. Aggregated data sets are typically intended to be unidentifiable at the level of an individual person, however the recent appearance of massively popular social networking sites on the internet has been shown to enable reidentification of individuals in data sets previously assumed to be de-identified. See De-identified Data, Re-identified Data AHA - American Hospital Association AHIC - American Health Information Community, formerly a 17 member federal advisory body assembled in 2005 to make recommendations to the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) on how to accelerate the development and adoption of health information technology. Disbanded in 2008, and succeeded by the National eHealth Collaborative. See HHS, NeHC, ONC AHIMA - American Health Information Management Association AHIP - America's Health Insurance Plans AHLTA - The Armed forces Health Longitudinal Technology Application. See CHCS AHRQ - The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality is major division in the U. S. Department of Health and Human Services. The mission of AHRQ is to improve the quality, safety, efficiency, and effectiveness of health care for all Americans. See HHS top AIRA - American Immunization Registry Association, publisher of the Implementation Guilde for Immunization Messaging for HL7 v2.5.1. See HL7, CVX, MVX, QDP, VXU Ajax - Acronym for a combination of technologies, classic Ajax includes asynchronous JavaScript and XML. See JavaScript, REST, XML Algorithm - A method of problem solving in which instructions are followed in a (usually) specific sequence. Algorithms may involve numeric calculation. See Care Pathway, Expert System, Guideline, Inference Engine, Protocol AMA - American Medical Association See CPT AMIA - American Medical Informatics Association, a national member society of IMIA. See IMIA, Informatics ANA - American Nurses Association Analog - An analog signal is continuous in time and amplitude, as opposed to a digital signal, which is discrete. Legacy voice grade phone systems, sometimes called Plain Old Telephone Service (POTS), use analog circuits. See Broadband, Dialup, Digital, POTS, Signal, VoIP ANSI - The American National Standards Institute is the U.S. member body to the ISO. ANSI does not write standards; rather the Institute accredits standards developers that will establish consensus among qualified groups. See HITSP, ISO top Answering Machine - A simple analog or digital device to record messages on a telephone. See Voice Mail APA - American Psychological Association APHA - American Public Health Association APHL - Association of Public Health Laboratories API - Application program interface Application - Computer program that carries out a specific task, such as a "word processing application" or an LIS or EHR. See EHR, LIS ARRA - The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, a $787 billion stimulus measure signed into law by President Obama on February 17, 2009. A portion of the law provides funding for aggressive health IT spending. See Cal eConnect, CalHIPSO, HITECH, REC, SDE ASP - Application Service Provider, a type of Client-Server installation where a business hosts computer-based services for customers to access across a network, such as EHR or PMS solutions accessed over the Internet. See Client-Server, EHR, PMS, SaaS ASTHO - Association of State and Territorial Health Officials is a non-profit membership association representing the chiefs of state and territorial health agencies. See CDC, CDPH, WHO top ASTM - American Society for Testing and Materials began as a domestic engineering standards body and recently evolved into an international standards organization (ISO). See CCR, ISO Audit Logs - Records created by hardware (servers, routers, firewalls, etc.) or software (data bases, network systems, individual applications, etc.) that track when data are created, modified, transmitted or destroyed, including the identity of the user initiating the action. Authentication - The physical or process method or methods employed to prove that the person or entity seeking access to information has the proper authorization. Generally used to protect confidential information by limiting access to computer systems to authorized users. Passwords are an example of a commonly employed authentication process. See Access Control, Authorization, Certificate Authority, Non-Repudiation Authorization - A system established to grant access to generally confidential information. Authorization generally establishes the level of access an individual or entity has to data based on the identity established by an authentication process. See Access Control, Authentication

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Health Informatics Glossary