Guided Notes

Representing Clinical Knowledge: Guidelines, Rules & CQL

From narrative guidelines to computable knowledge — rules, decision tables, order sets, Arden Syntax, Clinical Quality Language (CQL), CDS Hooks and knowledge management.

The knowledge translation problem

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Clinical guidelines are written for humans: 'Consider statin therapy for adults 40–75 with diabetes.' Computers need precise logic: which patients, which codes, which time windows, what action. Turning guidelines into computable knowledge requires resolving ambiguity ('consider'), choosing data definitions and deciding how to present recommendations.