Is VN Core an official publication of an HL7 Affiliate in Vietnam?

No. VN Core is a trial-use project Implementation Guide currently maintained by Omi HealthTech. An HL7 Affiliate is an organisational status, not an IG status; the project does not claim that HL7 International or an HL7 Affiliate has approved or endorsed this publication.

Who can contribute to VN Core and what is the process?

Any organisation or individual — hospital, vendor, regulator, researcher — can contribute under CC-BY-4.0. Current process: read the IG, find a real-world gap, send a structured proposal to info@hl7.org.vn with legal basis (TT/QĐ/NĐ/Luật) or clear clinical justification, then the maintainer triages it for review and release.

What licence does VN Core use? Is commercial use free?

CC-BY-4.0. You may fork, copy, modify, and use commercially with proper attribution. Vendors can integrate VN Core into commercial HIS/EMR products without prior permission.

Which organisation maintains VN Core?

Omi HealthTech is the maintainer. Editorial, release engineering, IG build, and source-control infrastructure are operated by Omi. When the Working Group Technical Steering forms, breaking-change decisions move to a 5-role voting model.

Governance

Open governance, with explicit authority boundaries.

VN Core is a trial-use project Implementation Guide. Affiliate is an organisational status and does not describe an IG. Project maintenance, technical maturity, and pilot evidence do not by themselves constitute approval by HL7 International or national recognition.

Operating principles

Open by default

Every public artifact, decision, and review note is published under CC-BY-4.0. The project's canonical technical publication is at fhir.hl7.org.vn; external reuse is welcomed with attribution and governance context.

Traceability appropriate to the source

Codes and constraints derived from Vietnamese catalogs cite the issuing instrument. International terminology, clinical content, and technical decisions cite the relevant standard, professional evidence, or design rationale; not every code needs an artificial legal reference.

Scoped, evidence-backed transition

VN Core does not claim to replace XML 4210/3176. A mapping or ConceptMap is published only for a modeled, sourced, status-labelled, and tested scope; coexistence depends on the actual integration contract.

Impact-based legal review

New instruments are triaged by effective date, scope, and compatibility risk. A legal patch may ship out of cycle after review; the project has not approved a fixed response or release SLA.

Roles

Role	Who	Scope
Maintainer	Omi HealthTech	Editorial, release engineering, IG build, contribution intake, publishing infrastructure.
Technical steering	Pending — open call	Profile design decisions, breaking change votes, IG architecture.
Legal advisor	Pending — open call	Reviews each release for legal accuracy before publication.
Contributors	Open	Evidence-backed proposals, terminology curation, example data, implementation reports.

How to contribute

1

Read the IG

Get familiar with VN Core profiles and CodeSystems at fhir.hl7.org.vn.
2

Find a gap

A missing extension, a stale legal reference, a missing example, a profile mismatch with hospital workflow.
3

Send a structured proposal

Until public workflow is approved, email the maintainer with scope, affected artifact, and evidence.
4

Review and release

The maintainer triages the proposal, records the evidence, validates the change, and schedules it for release when accepted.

Versions, releases & package layering

VN Core is at v0.9.0, released as 8 modular packages: seven specialised packages (core.base, pharmacy, bhyt.submission, patient-access, terminology.clinical, terminology.traditional-medicine, and device) plus one aggregate core package. From v0.9.0, the two tracks whose legal basis changes fastest are split out of the core per ADR-0020: hl7.fhir.vn.pharmacy (ePrescription, dispensing, national pharmacy-database exchange) and hl7.fhir.vn.patient-access (VNeID health record, periodic health check-ups). Dependency chain: core.base ← pharmacy ← patient-access, and hl7.fhir.vn.bhyt.submission depends on hl7.fhir.vn.core.base; they are not independent data-model layers. Versioning follows SemVer in the 0.x phase, with three classes of change:

Patch (0.6.x)

Narrative, example, typo and metric-sync fixes. No change to artifact meaning, no migration required.

Additive (0.x.0)

Adds a new profile/extension/ValueSet/CodeSystem or relaxes a constraint. Backward-compatible with the previous release.

Breaking (0.X.0 → 1.0.0)

Tightens cardinality, changes binding strength, or renames/removes a canonical. A migration note is mandatory; a retired code is never reused for a different meaning.

Technical governance documents (IG)

Change classification & release gate →6-package architecture →Design decisions (ADR) →Identifier & OID registry →Stability & maturity →Conformance →

HL7 Affiliate status: a separate organisational process

Active 2026

Project trial-use IG

VN Core is maintained openly by Omi HealthTech as a trial-use project Implementation Guide. Affiliate status applies to an organisation, not to an IG.

Planned 2026 – 2027

Multi-stakeholder governance

Expand technical steering, disclosed or review-eligible pilots, conformance testing, and implementation evidence. These activities improve the IG but do not confer Affiliate status.

Future 2027+

Assess an Affiliate pathway

If eligible stakeholders reach agreement, an appropriate representative organisation or coalition may consider the HL7 International Affiliate process. VN Core does not designate Omi HealthTech or any other party to lead a filing.

"HL7®" and "FHIR®" are trademarks of Health Level Seven International. VN Core is a trial-use project Implementation Guide; it is not an Affiliate and is not presented as a publication approved by HL7 International or an HL7 Affiliate. The name "HL7 Vietnam" identifies this project and does not assert organisational Affiliate status. Contact [email protected] for governance questions.