Format guide
HL7 v2
Health Level 7 version 2.x messaging
HL7 v2 is the universal messaging standard between U.S. hospital systems — Epic, Cerner, Meditech, Allscripts, Athena all speak it for ADT (admit/discharge/transfer), ORU (observation results), ORM (orders), and billing messages. Format dates to 1989; v2.5 (2003) is the most-deployed version. Pipe-delimited segments with caret-separated components and tilde-separated repetitions; the MSH header carries encoding characters and routing metadata. Despite FHIR's modern push, v2 still powers the operational backbone of most hospital networks.
How to open a HL7 v2 file
Any text editor — HL7 v2 is plain text with `|`/`^`/`~` as delimiters. Specialized viewers (Mirth Connect, Iguana, NextGen Connect, IBM Sterling) parse + index segments. For programmatic use, libraries exist for every language (HAPI in Java/.NET, hl7v2-js in Node).
Primary use
Hospital-to-hospital and intra-hospital clinical messaging.
Convert other formats to HL7 v2
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