DAPB4060: Booking and Referral Standard (BaRS)

The Booking and Referral Standard is an interoperability standard for patient record systems that enables booking and referral information to be sent between NHS service providers quickly, safely and in a format that is useful to clinicians integrated into their existing healthcare IT systems e.g. NHS 111 Provider and a receiving organisation e.g. Emergency Department. BaRS includes an API which uses Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources (FHIR) UK Core 4 replacing other deprecated standards such as ITK.

BaRS consists of:

• BaRS Core that provides a core set of functionality required for every application
• BaRS Applications that provide distinct functionality for each use case.

The standard will be amended to support future use cases. Details on the current use cases supported can be found on the Booking and Referral Standard Website. Further information on how to implement BaRS can be found in the Implementation Guide.

The current work is part of the overarching programme to update and modernise all bookings, referrals and appointments management in the NHS, and the new standard being developed will be capable of being adapted and implemented for a range of use cases.

This information standard is published under section 250 of the Health and Social Care Act 2012. An Information Standards Notice (see below) provides an overview of scope and implementation timescales, and the requirements specification provides further detail for those who have to implement the information standard.