Author: Abhin B.T.
Introduction
HL7 provides a framework for data exchange and storage in health care. It is achieved by defining how the data is packaged and moved. The purpose is to seamlessly integrate with any system with HL7 standards. The important function is to facilitate interoperability between healthcare systems. It helps in making sure all the data remains consistent across all the systems.
What is HL7?
Health Level 7 (HL7) is created by Health Level Seven International. It is a non-profit organization dedicated to developing standards for electronic health care data. HL7 standards are developed through the dedicated collaboration of volunteers worldwide who represent healthcare vendors, providers, payers, policy makers, consultants and others.
HL7 and MuleSoft
When we deal with HL7 version 2 data, there is a specific connector or parser available in MuleSoft. HL7 Connector is by default not available in MuleSoft Anypoint Studio. The HL7 connector is available in Anypoint Exchange.
How to get a HL7 connector in Anypoint Studio?
Click on the search in Exchange in Mule Palette.
Search for HL7.
Add the module and select the version feasible for you and click on finish.
Now you can find it in Mule Palette. There will be two options available. One is read operation and the other is write. Read connector converts the HL7 data to MuleSoft/other application understandable format.
How to use MuleSoft HL7 Connector?
For demonstration purpose, I am using the HL7 as a parser to convert the HL7 data to json format.Â
Here, I am using a Http listener to listen to HL7 v2 data. Use the HL7 read to parse the data and Transform message to convert to json format.
I have used the Listener configuration with default information.
In the HL7 read Connector, I have specified the Read content as payload so that the HL7 connector converts the payload received from the http request.
In the Connection Configuration, specify the schema that is used to parse the data. In my demo, I am using HL7 version 2, ADT A01.
Reference: http://www.hl7.eu/refactored/msgADT_A01.html
NB: You can also create a custom schema and use it in the place of available schema.
 In the transform message component, I am converting the payload to json.
Now our flow is ready for testing the HL7 conversion.
I am sending the HL7 data through postman.
We have received the response with the json data.
Conclusion
We will be able to resolve the problem faced by the Healthcare industry regarding interoperability by using MuleSoft.
Even though there is a lot of functionality available in this HL7 connector, here I have shown only the parsing functionality. I will be covering the remaining functionalities in my upcoming blogs.