File Exchange Integrations - Overview

A common type of integration sends files, often HL7 messages, to another system by placing them in a folder in an SFTP host that both systems have access to and, conversely, receives files from that system via the SFTP host. Ovation calls these “file exchange” integrations and you can create as many of them as you need.

Some possible applications of file exchange integration include

• creating requisitions from an external system and sending corresponding test results back to that system
• initiating billing by transmitting necessary information to a billing service provider
• sending out requisitions to a partner facility for fulfillment and receiving test results back from that facility

File exchange integrations are made up of one or more “routes,” each of which has one or more “actions.”

Each “outbound” route tells Ovation: “when this thing happens, send these files.” The first part (“when this thing happens…”) is the “trigger” and the files you want the system to send when that happens are configured in the “actions.”

Each “inbound” route tells Ovation: “when files appear in this folder, do this with them.” You configure what to do with which files in the route’s actions.

Triggers for outbound routes always occur in the context of a requisition and sometimes in a more precise context, such as a sample on a requisition or patient results report on a sample. Routes can also limit the “scope” to which they apply by limiting which requisitions the trigger will fire on (limited, for example, to a selected project) or by something within the requisitions, depending on the nature of the trigger, such as the workflow that a sample went through for a trigger like “Report Signed.”

Inbound routes always either create requisitions or update them by adding documents to them.