I have a longstanding question about LOINC panels. I’ve always interpreted panels as a strict relationship between the panel LOINC and its constituent LOINCs. Even when a panel LOINC might make sense from a “visual definition” perspective, if the LOINCs in the panel don’t match, I don’t map to that panel. This makes sense from the “letter of the law” perspective, which makes sense from a computational standpoint, but it’s a recipe for combinatorial explosion on a massive scale.
Is it proper to map LOINC panels by name rather than their precise structure?
Could some panels be modified to include more than one LOINC per panel component – with some sort of conditional modifier so it’s clear it’s “one or the other”?
An example is LOINC panel 93715-1 Francisella tularensis IgG and IgM panel - Serum. It consists of a nice panel name, and 3 components that don’t list method.
- 7889-9 Francisella tularensis IgG Ab [Presence] in Serum
- 7890-7 Francisella tularensis IgM Ab [Presence] in Serum
- 93718-5 Francisella tularensis IgG and IgM [Interpretation] in Serum
I have an identical panel, except we send this to a reference lab who has assigned method-specific LOINC codes to the components of the panel (other than the interp, since there was no method-specific LOINC for it).
- 93717-7 Francisella tularensis IgG Ab [Presence] in Serum by Immunoassay
- 93716-9 Francisella tularensis IgM Ab [Presence] in Serum by Immunoassay
- 93718-5 Francisella tularensis IgG and IgM [Interpretation] in Serum