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The eHealth integration toolkits are a collection of integration tools and sample code resources available in both .NET and Java. The sample code and integration tools are used within the eHealth reference platform, forming part of the code library for tools and simulators.

Access to sample code and the eHealth reference platform’s online simulator services is supported by suitable right-to-use licenses and terms and conditions regarding the eHealth reference platform.

The secure messaging integration toolkit contains libraries for business-to-business connectivity to Secure Message Delivery (SMD) and Endpoint Location Services (ELS), providing sample code for all operations as well as a Medical Document Management (MDM) library to create the payload for SMD. It also includes secure messaging conformance test tools, which support the Australian Technical Specification for Secure Message Delivery (ATS 5822-2010).

Secure messaging integration toolkit in the Australian context

The sample code and integration tools provided here should only be used in conjunction with the Australian Digital Health Agency’s detailed specifications for clinical documents and messaging infrastructure.

Feature specifications

Current specifications

The Australian secure messaging standards provide a general-purpose secure web service protocol for the delivery of business service messages from one healthcare provider organisation to another.

The secure messaging standards are:

The SMD standard makes use of the XSP and WSP standards. These standards supersede the previous Australian secure messaging specifications, including:

The secure messaging integration toolkit libraries, sample code and test tools all support the Australian Technical Specification for SMD (ATS 5822-2010). All existing SMD implementations are based on the older ATS 5822-2010 and its related XSP and WSP specifications. The Agency has published a conformance assessment scheme and conformance test tools for ATS 5822 and conformance to ATS 5822 is required for the Department of Health's Practice Incentive Program (PIP) eHealth incentive. Subject to industry agreement and budget approvals the Agency will update the conformance assessment scheme and the secure messaging integration toolkit to support AS 5552-2013 and its related XSP and WSP specifications in the future.

Related specifications and foundations

Secure messaging relies on the use of X.509 public key infrastructure certificates. Secure messaging implementations may utilise a combination of NASH PKI certificates and certificates issued by commercial secure messaging providers. Existing SMD implementations make use of the Endpoint Location Service (ELS)v1.3 specification and the healthcare provider directory that is provided as part of the Healthcare Identifiers Service. Over time these will be superseded by the HL7™ FHIR® standard provider directory interface.

Related specifications

Roadmap

Roadmap: 
October, 2016
Completed
This version of the Secure Messaging Integration Toolkit provides updated NASH PKI test certificates required by the Secure Messaging Test Harness and Secure Messaging Delivery Agent tools. Test certificates provided with previous releases of the toolkit expired on 13 September 2016. Continued use of the tools requires the replacement of these test certificates. Both the new test certificates and the tools are included in v1.0.1 of the Secure Messaging Conformance Test Tools - Software Package.
June, 2016
Completed
Version 1.2.2 of the Secure Messaging Integration Toolkit provides an update to the HL7TMMDM Library to address an important issue that could prevent MDM from being accepted by SMD messaging endpoints or receiving systems.
May, 2016
Completed
Version 1.2.1 of the Secure Messaging Integration Toolkit provides an update to the Secure Message Delivery B2B Client Library (SMD Library) to accommodate a requirement introduced by a security patch for the .NET framework that was published by Microsoft on 8 March 2016. This update addresses an issue that can affect both the transmission and reception of clinical documents via secure messaging. The new .NET requirement has the potential to affect a large number of sites using Windows Vista, 7, 8.1, 10, 2008 or 2012 that have installed the Microsoft security patch published on 8 March 2016. More detailed information is available in the release note itself.
December, 2015
Completed
This release includes the Secure Messaging Conformance Test Tools – Software Package and its product data sheet, which give further details of the software package.
November, 2014
Completed
In this release, the Java library has been updated and aligned with all other Java-based code to support up to Java version 7.2.1.
March, 2014
Completed
The eHealth integration toolkits are a collection of integration tools and sample code resources available in both .NET and Java. The sample code and integration tools are used within the eHealth Reference Platform, forming part of the code library for tools and simulators. Access to sample code and the eHealth Reference Platform's online simulator services is supported by suitable right-to-use licenses and terms and conditions regarding the eHealth Reference Platform. The Secure Messaging Integration Toolkit contains libraries for B2B connectivity to Secure Message Delivery (SMD) and Endpoint Location Services (ELS), providing sample code for all operations, as well as a Medical Document Management (MDM) library to create the payload for SMD.