SNOMED CT
An international standard for clinical terminology published by SNOMED International and providing a global common language for health terms.
About this standard
- Publisher
- NHS England
- Reference code
- SCCI0034 Amd 35/2016
- Publication date
- 02/11/2016
- Status
- Active
Show definitions of statuses
Active. Active standards are stable, maintained and have been approved, assured or endorsed for use by qualified bodies.
Deprecated Deprecated standards are available for use and are maintained, but are being phased out, so new functionality will not be added.
Retired standards Retired standards are not being maintained or supported and should not be used.
- Standard type
- Information standards
Show definitions of standard types
Collections. A Collection is a systematic gathering of a specified selection of data or information for a particular stated purpose from existing records held within health and care systems and electronic devices.
Extractions. An extraction is a type of collection that is pulled from an operational system by the data controller and transmitted to the receiver without additional processing or transcription by the sender.
Information standards. Information standards are agreed ways of doing something, written down as a set of precise criteria so they can be used as rules, guidelines, or definitions.
Technical Standards and specifications. Technical standards and specifications specify how to make information available technically including how the data is structured and transported.
- Contact point
Link to standard
- Documentation
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- Applies to
- All organisations directly providing and/or commissioned to provide NHS, Public Health and/or Adult Social Care services.
- Impacts on
- Implementation of the change to this information standard applies to IT systems that relate to the direct management of the health and care of the patient and any secondary uses of such data. Suppliers of systems to the above providers and commissioners should work with their customers to determine necessary changes. This change also impacts any current users of the READ codes. (Please refer to the notices relating to the retirement of READ codes 1552 and 1553.) Use within social care is in development and future communications around expectations and timescales will be provided in due course. Social care providers can seek support and advice through the UK Terminology Centre, should they want to adopt SNOMED CT. However this fundamental standard does not mandate a timetable for its use in social care.
- Associated medias
- NHS England SNOMED CT browser The NHS England online browser contains the SNOMED CT International release, the UK Clinical Extension, the UK Drug Extension, and the UK Pathology Extension.
- NHS England SNOMED CT browser
- Effective from
- 02/11/2016
Topics and care settings
- Topic
- Clinical decision support
- Clinical safety
- Data definitions and terminologies
- Interoperability
- Key care information
- Messaging
- Prescribing
- Reference data
- Tests and diagnostics
- Vaccination
- Care setting
- Community health
- Dentistry
- GP / Primary care
- Hospital
- Maternity
- Mental health
- Pharmacy
- Social care
- Urgent and Emergency Care
Dependencies and related standards
- Related standards
- Dictionary of Medicines and Devices (dm+d) SCCI0052
- Read Clinical Terms Version 2 ISB 1553 SNOMED CT supersedes READ codes as a terminology.
- Read Clinical Terms Version 3 ISB 1552: SNOMED CT supersedes READ codes as a terminology.
- Dictionary of Medicines and Devices (dm+d)
Review Information
- Scope
- Health Services, NHS Services, Adult Social Care
- Sponsor
Sean Kirwan, Department of Health
- Senior Responsible Officer
Tom Denwood, Director of National Provider Support, NHS England
- Business Lead
- Lynn Bracewell, Head of Terminology and Classifications Development Services, NHS England
- Approval date
- 02/11/2016
- Post Implementation review Date
- 01/04/2019
Legal basis and endorsements
- Legal authority
Section 250 of the Health and Social Care Act 2012
This information standard is published under section 250 of the Health and Social Care Act 2012
More information
SNOMED CT was published as an information standard by the Information Standards Board in August 2011; this version details amendments to both the published standard and the dates for implementation.
SNOMED CT is an international clinical terminology that provides the vocabulary for IT systems to support the direct management of the health and care of an individual.
It also enables the representation of clinically relevant information consistently and reliably in a way that can be processed by IT systems. This enables IT systems to exchange data across the health and care environment; provide clinical decision support tools and undertake enhanced analytics to support effective delivery of high quality healthcare to individual people and populations.
SNOMED CT is required to be used for communicating clinical content across health and care within the NHS standard contracts and is also stated as the required terminology to support direct management of care within the policy document published by the National Information Board (NIB): Personalised Health and Care 2020: A Framework for Action.
About this change
SNOMED CT is the only current information standard for clinical terminology and this change seeks to ensure its implementation is planned to coincide with national requirements in relation to electronic records. There are three elements to the change:
- Confirmation of the timescales for the cessation of SNOMED CT releases in Release Format 1 (RF1) and the subsequent move to releases only being provided in Release Format 2 (RF2). All existing users (including any social care providers) will need to change to RF2.
- Conversion of the current information standard to align with the requirements of the Health and Social Care Act 2012. This includes the provision of Implementation Guidance.
- Confirmation of application of this standard in specified operational settings including implementation dates in alignment with national policy.
Existing users need to be aware that SNOMED CT will be required to be incorporated into any future information standards that require consistent recording and interoperability of clinically related data items.
Implementation dates
All Current users (including any social care users) of SNOMED CT in Release Format 1 (RF1) must move to SNOMED CT in Release Format 2 (RF2) no later than 1 October 2018.
Providers of health and care are required to be paperless at the point of care before 2020: supporting IT systems must incorporate SNOMED CT as the clinical terminology.
The following is a summary of conformance dates for appropriate implementation of SNOMED CT that all providers and standards developers must be aware of when planning new, or making changes to existing IT systems or relevant operational information standards:
- Systems used by, or communicating coded clinical data to, General Practice service providers must use SNOMED CT as the clinical terminology within the system before 1 April 2018. SNOMED CT must be utilised in place of the READ codes before 1 April 2018.
- Systems used within Secondary Care, Acute Care, Mental Health Services, Community Services, Dentistry and Optometry - for the direct management of care of an individual - must use SNOMED CT as the clinical terminology standard within all electronic patient level recording and communications before 1 April 2020.
- Systems used by all other providers of health related services where the flow of information for the direct management of patient care comes into the NHS must use SNOMED CT by 1 April 2020.
Mandated dates for implementation in social care are expected to be part of a future update of the standard.
Page last updated: 13 May 2024