How can I split the OBX segment in an MDM message in to multiple OBX segments?

Question

We're exporting a letter from Centricity EMR via LinkLogic to Qvera in HL7 MDM format. When Centricity exports the message, it exports one OBX segment with the data separted by tildas. A downstream system requested that we send the data in multiple OBX segments. Can this be accomplished?

Current OBX example:

OBX|1|ST||| data line 1 ~ data line 2 ~ data line 3 ~~~ data line x ...

 

Desired OBX example:

OBX|1|ST||| data line 1 ...

OBX|2|ST||| data line 2 ...

OBX|3|ST||| data line 3 ...

OBX|4|ST||| ...

OBX|5|ST||| ...

OBX|6|ST||| data line x...

Answer 1

This can be done with a String.split('~') and then cycling the result.  Here is an example of an HL7 message with one OBX segment being replaced by multiple OBX segments (one for each value in the original OBX).

 

// get OBX data

var value = message.getNode('OBX-5');

qie.debug('OBX-5 Value:' + value);

 

// save original OBX segment

var obxSegment = qie.parseHL7String(message.getNode('OBX[1]'));

 

// remove original OBX segment

message.removeFirstNode('OBX');

 

// split the data on the tilda

var individualSegments = value.split('~');

qie.debug('Segments Found:' + individualSegments.length);

 

// cycle individual segments and create new OBX segment

var segments = '';

for (var i = 0; i < individualSegments.length; i++) {

   qie.debug('Segment ' + i + ':' + individualSegments[i]);

   

   // set OBX sequence

   obxSegment.setNode('OBX-1', i+1);

   

   // set OBX value

   obxSegment.setNode('OBX-5', individualSegments[i]);

   

   qie.debug('OBX Segment ' + i + ':' + obxSegment.toString());

   segments += obxSegment.toString() + '\n';

}

 

// place new segments after the PID segment of the original message

message.addChildAfter('PID', 'OBX', segments);

 

Comments

Worked like a charm and it's simple.

Answer 2

//Get the observation values from OBX-5 and split them on the tilde character

var obsValues = StringUtils.splitByWholeSeparator(source.getNode('OBX-5'), '~');

 

//Get the current OBX segment to use as a template for all OBX fields except OBX-1 & OBX-5

var obxSeg = qie.parseHL7String(source.getNode('OBX'));

 

//Remove current OBX segment

message.removeAllNodes('OBX');

 

//Create a New OBX segment for each value and add to message.

for (var i=0 ; i < obsValues.length ; i++) {

   var obsValue = obsValues[i];

   //Reset OBX fields

   obxSeg.setNode('OBX-1', i+1);

   obxSeg.setNode('OBX-5', obsValue);

   //Add new OBX segment to message

   message.addChild('/', 'OBX', obxSeg.toString());

}