LOINC version 2.74 is available for download from the LOINC website.
We are pleased to announce the release of LOINC version 2.74 that includes new, edited, and newly mapped concepts in Laboratory, Clinical, Survey, and other domains. It features the streamlined file structure adopted since February 2022 release for more efficient download and use. Some highlights include:
- 608 new concepts
- 464 Laboratory
- 95 Clinical
- 49 Surveys
You can read more about all changes in the LOINC Release Notes in the LOINC Knowledge Base.
Release 2.74 highlights
We collaborate with stakeholders and the healthcare community to ensure LOINC is relevant and responsive to current and evolving healthcare trends and challenges. The results of our collaborative efforts featured in this release include:
- Over 140 new microbiology concepts including:
- two-tiered serological testing to screen and confirm the presence of Lyme’s disease in collaboration with FDA, CDC and APHL
- PCR assays for simultaneous detection and differentiation of monkeypox virus based on clade and lineage.
- new and updated testing and evaluation methods related to SARS-Cov-2 virus and the COVID-19 pandemic to support specialized microorganism testing as recommended by the CDC.
- new concepts for microbiology testing to identify bacteria, virus and fungus in veterinary specimens using variety of methods ranging from standard culture testing to gene sequencing.
- Other areas of Laboratory LOINC with additions and updates include:
- new concepts for antibody and antigen evaluation and testing in blood bank
- updates in coagulation testing including the Thrombin generation test, silica clotting time to support the laboratory diagnosis of lupus, and Factor X inhibitor evaluation.
- additions to serology including testing for the presence of Contactin-associated protein 1Ab.IgG, Neurochondrin AB, and Septin -7 AB. IgG related to calculating the risk of solitary lung nodule malignancy
- more than 30 new concepts related to molecular genetic testing including NAT2 gene, lung cancer targeted gene fusion transcript analysis, preimplantation multigene analysis, HBA1 & 2 mutation analysis, and SMA residual risk, and genotyping for HIV reverse transcriptase failed codons, HIV 1 group M RNA genotype, HIV protease failed codons, HIV integrase failed codons.
- Updates to Clinical LOINC feature:
- concepts to assess falls risk using the SCHMID and CHAMPS falls risk assessment tools.
- more concepts were created and added to the Survey class in the Document Ontology domain. The additional terms are notes in history, physical, surgical operation, consultation, conference and others.
To assist the LOINC user community with implementation, we provide several software resources. While these tools are no longer tied to LOINC database updates, a number do coincide with the 2.74 release.
We have made significant behind-the-scenes improvements to LOINC details pages. This collection of web pages for each LOINC code (e.g., loinc.org/89371-9) have been rewritten to allow us to continuously improve them. They will continue to evolve based on feedback from users.
The LOINC Knowledge Base (KB) was introduced in 2020 as a means of collecting documentation such as the LOINC Users’ Guide and RELMA Users’ Guide in a single searchable online repository. To ensure our user community always has the most current information, we are no longer including PDF copies of these manuals with the downloadable LOINC distribution. Instead, we encourage users to access the KB compendium.
Starting with the next release of LOINC, version 2.75 in August, we no longer provide the Microsoft Access version of the database. This Loinc.mdb file has outgrown its usefulness as Access wanes in popularity. The CSV versions of the database will continue to remain available.
The LOINC Terminology Service using HL7® FHIR® has been updated with new terminology content for version 2.74. Shortly after this release we will make available an upgrade to this service which includes CodeSystem properties for all field in the primary LOINC table file.
Likewise, the SearchLOINC and Hierarchy Browser web apps have been updated with new content from version 2.74. A free LOINC login is required to access these resources.