SCATA - UK Society for Computing and Technology in Anaesthesia

Jargon Buster

The SCATA Jargon Buster is a compilation of many of the confusing terms and acronyms used in Health Informatics. It was compiled from various sources and is maintained by the SCATA membership.
If you are are a SCATA member, you can add and edit jargon terms from the member's area
Non-members can use the contact page to submit a new term or acronym, or to update an existing one.

Recent additions or updates: CDR | EMPI | FHIR | JSON | MPI

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Term or Acronym	Definition	Explanation
Caldicot Guardian		The person within an NHS Trust who is responsible for the systems that protect patient data, often the Medical Director.
CAP	College of American Pathologists	The CAP created SNOMED, now SNOMED CT
CAPTCHA	Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart	A CAPTCHA is a type of challenge-response test used in computing to determine whether the user is human. Trademarked by Carnegie Mellon University, a CAPTCHA involves a computer asking a user to complete a test. While the computer is able to generate and grade the test, it is not able to solve the test on its own. Because computers are unable to solve the CAPTCHA, any user entering a correct solution is presumed to be human. The term CAPTCHA was coined in 2000 by Luis von Ahn, Manuel Blum, Nicholas J. Hopper (all of Carnegie Mellon University), and John Langford (of IBM). A common type of CAPTCHA requires that the user type the letters of a distorted image, sometimes with the addition of an obscured sequence of letters or digits that appears on the screen.
CCIO	Chief Clinical Information Officer	The Chief Clinical Information Officer (CCIO) is a position that exists within the healthcare industry, that combines the expertise of a long-practicing medical clinician with the IT knowledge of a CIO role.
CDR	Clinical Data Repository	A real time data store that consolidates data from a variety of clinical sources to present a unified view of a single patient. It is optimized to allow clinicians to retrieve data for a single patient rather than to identify a population of patients with common characteristics or to facilitate the management of a specific clinical department. Typical data types which are often found within a CDR include: clinical laboratory test results, patient demographics, pharmacy information, radiology reports and images, pathology reports, hospital admission, discharge and transfer dates, ICD-9 codes, discharge summaries, and progress notes.
CDSS	Clinical Decision Support System	Clinical (or diagnostic) decision support systems (CDSS) are interactive computer programs, which are designed to assist physicians and other health professionals with decision making tasks. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clinical_decision_support_system for more information.
CHAI	Commission for Healthcare Audit and Inspection.
CHI	Community Health Index	The unique patient identification number used in NHS Scotland
CIMI	Clinical Information Modelling Initiative	Mission: Improve the interoperability of healthcare systems through shared implementable clinical information models.
CIO	Chief Information Officer	A senior NHS manager responsible for Information Services in a Trust, Strategic Health Authority etc.
Cluster		Any of the 5 groupings of Strategic Health Authorities in the NHS in England used for the award of LSP contracts as part of the NPfIT. They are: London South East and South West West Midlands and North West North East, Yorkshire and Humber East of England and East Midlands
CNST	Clinical Negligence Scheme for Trusts	The insurance scheme for NHS Trusts that protects against legal liability for clinical negligence claims. The amount of the premium depends on the sort of work undertaken, the number of beds, and the meeting of specified criteria that are judged to reduce clinical risks.
Contact		The secure NHS email and directory service, developed specifically to meet the requirements of the NHS and BMA for a secure email service for transmission of clinical information between NHS organisations. Despite this it is the policy of some NHS Trusts not to permit the use of email for the transmission of patient-identifiable information. www.nhs.net
Cookies		Cookies are data that is sent by a website and stored on computers browsing that site. Cookies allow websites to identify a returning visitor and hold information about them, for example, their login name, or what they have put in their online shopping cart.
CPRS	Clinical Product Reference Source.
CRDB	Care Record Development Board	“The Board will bring together patients and service users, the public, and social and healthcare professionals. It will identify the values, principles and processes of care and ensure that these are taken into account in the implementation of systems in NPfIT.”
CRS	Care Record Service
CTV3	Clinical Terms v3	A collection of over 200,000 terms developed during the Clinical Terms Project in 1992-5 and includes Read codes, ICD10 and OPCS4
Cybersquatting		Acquiring an Internet domain that should rightfully belong to someone else (e.g. a well-known company) with the intention of forcing them to buy it from you.