Enhanced Business Process Modeling as a Framework for LIMS Interoperability Requirements

The Coordinating Center for Infectious Diseases (CCID) within the Center for Disease Control and Prevention is enhancing the interoperability of its laboratory information system, STARLIMS, to improve the timely and accurate exchange of test orders and results between the state public health laboratories and the approximately 90 laboratories within CCID.  In order to capture the interoperability requirements, the flow of information to and from, within, and between the CCID laboratories must be documented.  An enhanced Business Process Modeling (BPM) framework was developed and used to determine these requirements.
Currently, there is no single recommended method for developing the requirements for an information system and therefore, it is left to the business analyst to determine the best approach.  BPM, one method traditionally used to organize workflow tasks, is an unstructured approach with many modeling techniques and language options including:  flow charts, matrices, and relationship diagrams.  Since each technique offers a distinctive perspective of the workflow, the selection of one modeling technique over another may limit the process knowledge that is gathered and subsequently reduce the ability to adequately describe requirements. Consequently, BPM is often combined with other business process analysis methodologies to generate a complete set of requirements for an information system.
The enhanced BPM that was developed for use in CCID has the advantage of providing a consistent methodology for developing requirements that support information flow within a complex laboratory environment.  The key components of the enhanced BPM framework are:  the technique, the notation, and the domain ontology. The strength of the framework is further enhanced when the framework components are coupled with an algorithm to provide a structured methodology that translates workflow elements to requirements. An added advantage is that the extensible framework may be used by any public health laboratory for which interoperability is a goal.