Concept explainer

The catalogue

Explains the orderable catalogue, the set of items a clinician can choose from, and how each item carries the detail an order needs.

The catalogue is the set of items a clinician can choose from when placing an order. Each item, an orderable, carries the detail an order needs, so you pick from an approved list rather than type.

What the catalogue is

An administrator builds the catalogue once for each site. It holds the medicines, tests, studies, procedures, consultations and forms the hospital offers. When you place an order, you choose from this list, so every order for the same item starts from the same agreed detail.

Forge holds the catalogue and keeps it fixed until an administrator changes it. Each site keeps its own catalogue, while shared reference data is managed centrally, so the items you see match the service your site provides.

What an orderable carries

Each item carries the detail an order needs, so the order arrives complete at the service that fulfils it. The item is authored once and reused for every order placed against it.

name string Required	The item's name as it reads when you order.
code string Required	A standard clinical code carried onto every order for the item.
kind string Required	Medication, laboratory test, imaging study, procedure, consultation or form.
defaultPriority string	Routine or urgent, applied to the order unless you change it.
requiresVerification boolean	Whether an order for this item waits to be verified before work begins.
visitTypes list Required	The kinds of visit the item is offered for.
routesTo string	The service or unit an order reaches when placed.
charge string	The price an order bills against. A form carries none.
resultForm string	The form a result is recorded on.

Coded against standards

Each item carries a standard clinical code, so an order means the same thing inside the hospital and to the systems it reaches. Items are coded against recognised standards such as SNOMED CT, LOINC and ICD-11, and the code travels onto the order at placement.

One approved item, one meaning

Because staff choose from a fixed catalogue, an order for the same item carries the same code, routing and result form every time. This keeps orders consistent across wards and across sites, and keeps a test on one ward the same test on another.

Families in the catalogue

A large catalogue reads more clearly in families. Medicines sit in one managed view, laboratory and imaging tests in another, and surgical treatments in a third. Each family is a slice of the one catalogue, built and maintained on its own, which keeps a formulary of thousands of medicines legible beside a shorter list of studies.

A catalogue item

Name and code

Kind

Default priority

Visit types

Routes to

Charge

Result form

What an administrator sees when defining one orderable. The item carries the detail every order for it inherits.

The catalogue and the order

Choosing an item resolves it into your order, and Forge freezes a snapshot of it at that moment. A later change to the catalogue leaves your placed order as it was, so the history reads exactly as it stood when you ordered.

Can I order something outside the catalogue?

You order from the catalogue your site maintains. An administrator adds a new item to the catalogue when the hospital begins to offer something new, and it becomes available to order from then on.

Does every site share one catalogue?

Each site keeps its own catalogue, so the items match that site's services. Shared reference data is managed centrally so codes stay aligned.

What keeps a placed order stable when the catalogue changes?

The order holds a snapshot of the item taken at placement. A change to the catalogue afterwards describes the item from then on and leaves the placed order untouched.

Follow an order through its states in the order lifecycle.