Current versions of LOINC and RELMA released June 30, 2012.
New Features
New LOINC Content
LOINC version 2.40 contains 70,689 terms, an increase of 2,339 since the December 2011 version. Approximately 1,055 terms have been edited. A total of 1,813 terms have been deprecated.
This release includes terms requested by a number of laboratory instrument and kit manufacturers (Sysmex, Ortho, Gen-Probe, etc.) and we anticipate more requests in the next release. Also included are numerous terms for survey instruments and questionnaires, including FACIT (Functional Assessment of Chronic Illness Therapy), FACT (Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy), Veterans Rand Study (VR-12 and VR-36) and CMS panels for physical assessment.
We are in the process of editing existing molecular genetics terms to harmonize with HUGO, HGVS and ISCN recommended nomenclature.
New RELMA Features
- While working on some new features for this release we also took some time to rethink and simplify the layout of the simple search and mapping screens.
Answer list searching
- We’ve added a new tab that lets you search for answer lists linked to LOINC codes. From the context menu of the grid you can “Find LOINCs that use this answer list”. Pretty handy.
Support for the new Top 2000 SI Version
- Based on our crowd favorite Top 2000+ Lab Observation list, we’ve now created a new SI version for those laboratories that favor reporting in molar units (e.g. mmol/L) over the mass units (e.g. mg/dL) that are prevalent in the US.
- RELMA now supports both the Top 2000+ US and SI versions as a search restriction, and it also displays the relevant rank for terms in the search result grids.
- Also, both the LOINC Mapper’s Guide to the Top 2000+ Lab Observations US and SI are included in your documentation directory when you install RELMA
Revamped spell checker
- The spell checker in the last version of RELMA didn’t work well at all. Sorry about that. We’ve fixed things up this time by completely rewriting that function so that it uses our favorite tool – Lucene.
Language translations
- Brand new for this release: French (France)
- Updated in this release: French (Canada), Italian (Italy), and Spanish (Spain)
Other features and bug fixes
- As usual, there are lots of other minor updates and fixes too. Read about them in the RELMA Release Notes.