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HL7 Australia has released the country's first national FHIR standard for structured electronic ordering of pathology and radiology tests in community-based care.
According to a media release, AU eRequesting Release 1.0 is the first FHIR standard in Australia to define a complete digital health service.
WHY IT MATTERS
The standard specifies how clinical and diagnostic systems place, access, and track electronic diagnostic requests through standardised, interoperable digital processes, replacing paper forms, fax, and phone-based workflows.
Unlike earlier Australian FHIR work focused on data models and patient record structures, AU eRequesting defines an end-to-end clinical workflow, covering how requests are structured, transmitted, updated, and returned to clinicians, as well as how patients receive status information.
[T]his is the first time we have specified an actual clinical service. This is a complete, end-to-end workflow that any vendor can implement today," HL7 Australia spokesperson Kate Ebrill was quoted as saying in a media release.
The specification was developed over three years through real-world implementation and national collaboration, including testing in live clinical environments and refinement through industry consultation.
AU eRequesting Release 1.0 is now ready for immediate implementation by software vendors and healthcare providers.
THE LARGER CONTEXT
The standard was shaped through the Sparked FHIR Accelerator, a national initiative involving the Australian Digital Health Agency (ADHA), the Department of Health and Aged Care, CSIRO, HL7 Australia, and stakeholders across the health and technology sectors. It aims to accelerate the creation and use of national FHIR standards for health information exchange and workflow.
"AU eRequesting is the first standard to graduate from the Sparked Accelerator, transitioning now into business-as-usual development under the governance of the HL7 Australia working groups," an ADHA spokesperson told Healthcare IT News.
The ADHA has also been advancing the AU Core Framework for Interoperability through the Sparked programme to define how APIs structure and transmit health data between systems
AU eRequesting also builds on earlier deployments of FHIR-based diagnostic requesting systems across major pathology and radiology providers, which informed most of the final specification.
Magentus, which partnered with diagnostic providers including Sonic Healthcare, Healius, Australian Clinical Labs, and Queensland X-Ray in early implementations, contributed to the development and testing of the standard.
According to the ADHA spokesperson, planning is underway for Release 2, expected to be developed through 2027, with scope currently being defined and broader industry participation being sought.
Australia has been laying the groundwork for national interoperability over several years, including a partnership between the ADHA and HL7 Australia to drive consistent adoption of FHIR standards nationwide.
This was followed by the release of the National Healthcare Interoperability Plan in 2023, outlining a roadmap for a more connected health system.
The 10-year Digital Health Blueprint, published later that year, also identified early work towards developing a national legislative framework for health information sharing across states and territories.
Subsequent efforts have focused on standardising systems and infrastructure, including the 2024 release of minimum software requirements for clinical and medication management systems in aged care, and the rollout of the Health Connect Australia programme in 2025 to establish national capabilities for data exchange.
Meanwhile, Telstra Health was awarded a more than $20 million contract to upgrade the clinical document architecture of the My Health Record system, following a law mandating the sharing of patient health information by default.
