What are health data standards?

At CIHI, all of our data standards are related to health and health care.

Health data standards are agreed-upon and documented ways of defining health-related concepts and patient information. They should be computable, understandable, replicable, reusable and interoperable. They contain technical specifications or other precise criteria designed to be used consistently as a rule, guideline or definition.

Implementing health data standards produces information that can be used

By clinicians and care teams to inform care provision and planning
By organizations to inform quality initiatives, improve health equity, manage resources and drive continuous improvement efforts
By health systems to inform resource allocation, benchmarking and funding models used by policy-makers and planners for health system use

How are the different types of health data standards used?

Content standards: Data required to produce the information. Code systems: Structured terms or codes that represent related concepts. Information standards: Information that health systems require. Data exchange standards: Requirements for how data will flow. Privacy and security standards: Requirements for privacy and data protection.

Type	Use	Details	Examples
Content standards	Data creation	Set out an agreed-upon and documented way of defining a health-related concept. They should contain precise information about how to collect data elements such that they are computable, replicable, reusable and interoperable. Content standards are foundational to the health data system. They must be applied to allow for the creation of usable data, or none of the uses and actions below are possible.	Clinical care and administrative data (e.g., admission date, diagnosis, workload) Population data for socio-demographic indicators (e.g., sex, gender) Population health (e.g., self-perceived health status, access to care) Determinants of health (e.g., income, housing) Data quality
Code systems	Data formatting	Represent related concepts; the code sets and/or formats that the data must adhere to	Classification systems, clinical reference terminologies and value sets ICD-10-CA, CCI, SNOMED CT CA, Health Utilities Index Mark 3 (HUI3), Low Income Measure (LIM) Thresholds Clinical documentation standards International standards (e.g., DSM-5, Dietary Reference Intakes)
Information standards	Data analysis	Turn data into the information that the health system requires (standards for indicators, methodologies for reporting purposes)	Quality, safety and access, including those for the Shared Health Priorities Population health and patient experiences Case-mix grouping methodologies
Data exchange standards	Data flow	Allow information to be submitted and transmitted, and to move seamlessly between systems and devices	HL7 v2/v3 CDA FHIR DDI, SDMX, JSON, xml
Privacy and security standards	Data protection	Protect the collection, use, disclosure and retention of personal information and de-identified data	ISO 27001 IPC/ON Manual for the Review and Approval of Prescribed Entities (PHIPA)

Visit the Data standards library

Additional material

MIS Standards

The Standards for Management Information Systems in Canadian Health Service Organizations (MIS Standards) provides an integrated approach to managing financial and statistical data related to the operations of Canadian health service organizations.

Go to MIS Standards

CIHI Reference Data Model

The CIHI Reference Data Model (CRDM) is a high-level, corporate-wide data architecture standard. The goal of the CRDM is to facilitate data integration across CIHI by having common terminology and meaning. To access the CRDM Toolkit, email us:

crdm@cihi.ca