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Calls for Community Review

Semantic interoperability in healthcare and the life sciences is not just a technical challenge. It affects how data about patients and studies is interpreted when it moves between hospitals, registries, and research infrastructures, with direct consequences for people’s lives. If different parties are to share and reuse data, they need to be able to adopt and trust a common semantic solution.

That trust depends on openness and community participation. A shared ontology can only succeed if the people who work with these concepts in practice can see how it is built, question its assumptions, and help improve it. Community review is therefore not an optional extra, but a core part of how we work.

When we finish modeling a domain or subdomain, the corresponding part of the Health-RI Ontology moves into external review. At that point we issue a time-bound Call for Community Review for that domain model, inviting domain and modeling experts to assess its correctness and completeness with respect to both the modeling (e.g., correct use of modeling constructs and patterns) and the domain (e.g., appropriate concepts, relations, and constraints).

These Calls for Community Review correspond to the external community review phase in the ontology validation lifecycle described in the Ontology validation and lifecycle page. Ontology packages follow a staged lifecycle with clear validation steps so that checks and changes remain transparent and traceable.

What does the external review involve?

You can contribute in any way that matches your expertise (domain or modeling) and the time you have available—any contribution is welcome.

In practice, this means looking at the model and its documentation and telling us what seems unclear, incorrect, missing, ambiguous, or misleading, especially regarding: (1) domain correctness and coverage, and (2) conceptual rigor and consistent use of modeling constructs.

Contributors can choose whether they are acknowledged. If you wish, you can be mentioned as a contributor to the (sub-)domain of the ontology you contributed to. If you prefer, your feedback can be handled anonymously.

All instructions on how to collaborate in each external review, including access to materials and feedback channels, are provided in the description of the corresponding call listed below.

Although each call has an explicit opening and closing date, contributions are welcome at any time. Outside an active call, please use the general Contribution Channels; your input will still be reviewed and may lead to updates in future releases.

During an open Call for Community Review, you can:

  • submit feedback using the relevant structured forms listed under Contribution Channels, or
  • contact project team members directly (for example, Pedro Paulo Favato Barcelos) to provide feedback, request clarifications, or invite us to join meetings for model walkthroughs and explanations.

For the general case, including domains without an active call or any follow-up after a call has closed, please use our available Contribution Channels.

Open Calls

This section lists currently active Calls for Community Review for specific domains or subdomains of the Health-RI Ontology.

Closed Calls

This section lists Calls for Community Review that have formally closed.

Feedback on these domains remains welcome. If you would like to comment on a domain that appears under a closed call, please submit your input via the general Contribution Channels and reference the relevant domain or call in your submission.