Provincial Client Registry
For health care organizations
The Provincial Client Registry (PCR) is the authoritative source for patient demographics and identifiers supporting electronic health records (EHRs) in Ontario. It provides a provincial patient identity and resolution service for health care providers to search for a patient, register a patient, and to enable access to a patient’s electronic health record, linking records from multiple points of care.
The PCR aggregates patient identity data in real-time from the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care’s Registered Persons Database (RPDB), hospitals, and participating health care organizations to provide current patient demographics and a comprehensive list of patient identifiers.
Features
As a foundational EHR service, the Provincial Client Registry supports patient identification in clinical viewers.
Includes patient demographics such as legal name, date of birth, gender and contact information as well as identifiers such as Ontario Health Card Number and medical record numbers, covering 98% of Ontarians.
Includes patient identifiers for 86% of Ontario hospitals and 100% of community care Local Health Integration Networks (LHINs).
Supports multiple health care interface standards to query (e.g. HL7 FHIR, V3, V2) and update (e.g. HL7 V3, V2) the registry.
Enables fast and efficient searches by patient demographics and/or identifiers.
Benefits
- Enables the creation of an integrated longitudinal EHR based on linked patient identifiers
- Facilitates the sharing of clinical information by establishing a common patient identity across all points of service
- Improves patient safety by reducing errors associated with patient misidentification
- Supports identification and remediation of source data quality issues impacting patient care (e.g. duplicates, overlays)
- Provides access to current provincial patient demographic information
- Reduces time spent manually updating patient demographic information within local client registries
Access Channels
Authorized health care providers access PCR via clinical viewers to support retrieval of their patient’s EHR:
ClinicalConnect
Authorized health care providers in South West Ontario can access PCR via ClinicalConnect™.
ConnectingOntario ClinicalViewer
Authorized health care providers in the Greater Toronto Area and Northern and Eastern Region can access PCR via ConnectingOntario ClinicalViewer.
eHealth Portal
Authorized health care providers who may not have access to other viewers, can access PCR via eHealth Portal.
Hospital Information System (HIS)
Authorized health care providers can access PCR directly via their hospital information system (HIS).
Technical Prerequisites
- Security Assertion Markup Language (SAML); standard for exchanging authentication and authorization data between the adopter and eHealth Ontario
- Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) Certificates; enables mutual authentication between the adopter and eHealth Ontario and secure transfer of data via supporting protocols
Non-Technical Prerequisites
- PCR onboarding (requirements, technical design, and conformance testing)
- Legal agreements
- Privacy and security assessments
Ready to Get Started?
Complete the online form to submit your request.