Encounters and observations

These definitions can also be found at the Concept Dictionary Basics Page

What is an encounter?

A patient visits a health center or hospital.  For each electronic form completed for a patient, a new encounter is created.  Each will have a unique encounter_id and encounter_type.  Forms could be completed by different departments (ie.  drug pickup, visit with an HIV clinician, Diabetes visit, food package received), and will have an associated encounter_type (ie. ART Drug Regimen Pickup, Adult intake, food assistance, lab test, etc).  Each encounter has an encounter type, date/time, location and provider.

What is an observation (obs)?

Within an encounter, different observations (aka obs) are recorded.  Obs_ids are unique (like snowflakes).  A new and unique obs_id is generated for every obs.  

These are possible scenarios:

• One visit with one encounter without observations – Touch screen patient registration in Haiti

• One visit with one encounter with one observation – Touch screen patient registration in Rwinkwavu, Rwanda with weight recorded

• One visit with one encounter and many observations – HIV followup form

• One visit with multiple encounters and many observations – HIV followup form along with ART drug regimen pickup.  This would show 2 encounters, where each encounter would have a different encounter id and encounter type.