SNOMED CT® is the clinical terminology approved as an Information Standard.
Requirements for utilising SNOMED CT® are stated within the National Information Board document "A Framework for Action".
SNOMED CT® provides the clinical language that facilitates electronic communication between healthcare professionals in clear and unambiguous terms, and can be used to code, retrieve and analyse clinical data.
SNOMED CT® is comprehensive and provides clinical terms for all healthcare professions. Applications often use subsets of SNOMED CT® that have been developed to support specific requirements. The NHS Data Model and Dictionary references SNOMED CT Subsets to support data reporting for specific data items.
SNOMED CT® is currently provided in two release formats:
- Release Format 1 (RF1)
- RF1 of SNOMED CT® contains SNOMED CT Subsets referenced by subset original ID
- RF1 will no longer be available after 1st April 2018
- Release Format 2 (RF2)
- RF2 of SNOMED CT® contains SNOMED CT Refsets referenced by refset ID. The simple form of SNOMED CT Refset is used to represent a SNOMED CT Subset and RF2 includes content that corresponds to RF1.
SNOMED CT® is managed and maintained internationally by the International Health Terminology Standards Development Organisation (IHTSDO) and in the UK by the UK Terminology Centre (UKTC).
National and International arrangements have been established to ensure there is adequate and relevant governance of SNOMED CT®, to ensure it meets the needs of healthcare in the respective jurisdictions with:
- United Kingdom Terminology Centre (UKTC) - UK governance arrangements
- International Health Terminology Standards Development Organisation (IHTSDO) - International governance arrangements.
Note: previous versions of SNOMED (including SNOMED RT and SNOMED 3) ceased to be licenced by the International Health Terminology Standards Development Organisation (IHTSDO) after April 2017 other than for historical content.
Mapping tables and guidance to enable historical data previously captured using a previous version of SNOMED, can be found on the Technology Reference Data Update Distribution (TRUD) at: SNOMED Antecedent Versions Data Migration.
For further information on SNOMED CT®, see the NHS Digital website at: SNOMED CT.
