Profile Development Process for First Timers

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This is how IHE Radiology works. Other domains will be similar but differ in dates and details.

  • We’re going to say “profile” a lot here but the process is essentially the same if your proposal was for a whitepaper, etc.


  • Before the first meeting there’s lots of work to do
  • Good news: you can hit the ground running because your plan is in your proposal
  • Start working on the steps listed in your Breakdown of Tasks
  • Contact the people listed in your Support and Resources and listed as Contributors
  • Get them working on considering your Open Issues and proposing ideas/resolutions
  • Start sketching the profile document
  • Use the current supplement template here
  • Practice Safe Pasting to avoid messing up your document (Paste text without formatting)
  • Note the guidance (in <italic text>) throughout the template
  • Material from your Use Case section will get you started on Section X.4 in Volume 1
  • Start working on an Actor/Transaction Diagram; it's a great highlevel tool
  • If you want to work up some Swimlane Diagram, check out http://www.websequencediagrams.com - it's simple and tidy.
  • For each new transaction, bullet list the existing transaction or standard that it will be based on and what details it will cover
  • Three meetings (and optional tcons) will get the profile from Proposal to Trial Implementation status.
  • Kickoff Meeting (early-Novemberish)
  • Arrive with a skeleton profile document as described above
  • Bring contentious/hard issues and be prepared to walk the committee through them
  • Make your best call for less contentious issues and write that into your skeleton.
  • It gives people something tangible to consider.
  • They can still disagree but if they agree you’ve saved time for more meaty discussions.
  • Committee will refine/flesh out missing Use Case details
  • Committee wil critique the document contents and help you work through open issues
  • Leave with a complete idea of how you’re going to draft all the text for public comment
  • PC Prep Meeting (Januaryish)
  • Arrive with a draft Public Comment version of the document
  • Committee will review in detail and vote it ready for public comment if it meets the following criteria
  • All parts of the profile are written (not in stone, but the parts are all in place)
  • All questions where you want or need input/confirmation/consent from the wider community are listed in the Open Issues section
  • Issues that have been decided but you want to avoid rehashing with the email reviewers who didn’t hear the discussion are documented in Closed Issues
  • Reviewers are permitted to re-open closed issues but they had better introduce new facts/considerations beyond what’s documented in the closed issue.
  • Leave with a ready to publish for PC (possibly after some remaining tidy-up edits)
  • TI Prep Meeting (Late March/Early Aprilish)
  • Arrive with a draft Trial Implementation version of the document, a consolidated list of the received comments, completed resolutions for most comments, proposed resolutions for some comments, and
  • Committee reviews in detail and votes it ready for trial implementation
  • All open issues must be closed, one way or another.
  • Leave with a doc ready to publish for TI (possibly with some remaining tidy-up edits)
  • General Meeting Notes
  • You get allocated a number of time slots based on the estimated effort in your proposal
  • Most meetings spread your timeslots over a couple days so you can do homework overnight after the first day to work on issues/ideas raised
  • Ideally, post a draft document to the meeting folder a week in advance of the meeting
  • While it’s understood that some domain experts may not be able to attend for the entire duration of the face to face meetings, it is strongly recommended. Rather than leaving or doing email when Other Profiles are being worked on, stay tuned in. Learn by watching others while you're not in the hotseat, and frankly the point of IHE is for everyone to contribute to everyone else's work. Your viewpoint is valuable and we benefit from the breadth all your views bring.
  • That being said, if you have travel constraints, or if you have contributors who will be joining the meeting by phone from another time zone, contact the co-chairs so they can take those constraints into account when scheduling the agenda.
  • Also, it’s expected that a profile editor may set up tcons with their contributors to work on the profile between face-to-face meetings


  • Where do things go?
  • If you're not on it yet, get on it now. This is where all the announcements, discussions, etc. go
  • Includes links to Agenda (times, places, logistics) and Minutes
  • Post documents here. Structure of meeting folders varies randomly each year


  • Reading/Reference List

Annex: Kickoff Closing Assessment

At the end of the Kickoff Meeting, the Technical Committee assesses each workitem to make sure everyone is on the same page about the expectations and remaining potential risks.

The purpose is to get a clear picture of aspects the authors will need to focus on between now and the Public Comment Preparation meeting.

  • Paste the following checklist items into the minutes; discuss and record findings for each
  • Profile Name:
    • Describe gaps in Use Case coverage
    • Review the "uncertainty points" in the evaluation. Is there a resolution plan for each?
    • Do the effort points in the evaluation still seem right?
    • Did the Breakdown of Tasks accurately reflect the work? What extra tasks arose?
    • Describe unresolved technical issues/tasks
    • Describe potential practical issues
    • Review the open issue list. Does it feel complete
    • Which open issues feel most risky; what other risks exist?
    • How is the work fitting in the allocated bandwidth? (Time to spare? Just right? Things were left undone?)
    • How does the scope feel? (Room to expand? Just right? Pretty ambitious?)
    • If you had to reduce scope, what would you drop?
    • Have the promised resources manifested?
    • What tasks would benefit from additional expertise?
    • What vendors are engaged for each actor? Record how many.
    • Was the profile where it needed to be at the start of the Kickoff meeting (See "Kickoff Meeting" above), if not what was the gap
    • Was the profile where it needed to be at the end of the Kickoff meeting, if not what was the gap
    • How many tcons would you like between now and the PC Prep Meeting?

It will be the responsibility of the Profile Editor to lead resolution of these issues before the Public Comment preparation meeting.

Resolution may involve:

  • Scheduling additional Tcons to complete the technical discussion
  • Reducing the scope of the profile to fit within the allocated % bandwidth
  • Including open issues in the PC Profile draft for wider comment (generally for issues that would not radically change the profile)
  • Changing the workitem from a profile to a whitepaper to explore the solution space if it is not ready for profiling.
    • Hopefully the whitepaper work is solid enough that it will be ready to profile next year and the same proposal will be selected again
  • Dismissing the workitem as not ready for profiling in the forseeable future.
    • This likely means there was something the TC should have caught during evaluation

For sample evaluations see: Rad_Tech_Minutes_2016-11-01_to_2016-11-04

Annex: PC-Prep Closing Assessment

  • Paste the following checklist items into the minutes; discuss and record findings for each
    • Profile Name:
    • Did we line-by-line the entire document
    • How ready is it to go out for PC: Completely, Almost, Soonish, Hmmm
    • Which open issues are risky, and why
    • Are all open issues phrased to solicit the needed information to close them?
    • Which use cases need more input
    • Which issues from the Kickoff Closing Assessment are still unresolved
    • What significant debates in PC-prep were not anticipated in the Kickoff
    • Review the "complexity points" in the evaluation. Did each get appropriate text coverage/resolution?
    • Do the effort points in the evaluation still seem right?
    • How does the scope feel in terms of being a useful chunk of work? (Needs more? Just right? More than enough?)
    • How is the work fitting in the allocated bandwidth? (Time to spare? Just right? Things were left undone?)
    • Did the Breakdown of Tasks accurately reflect the work? What extra tasks arose?
    • Looking forward, if you had to reduce scope to hit TI, what would you drop
    • Have the promised resources manifested
    • What vendors are engaged (for each actor)
    • When will we have sample data/objects
    • Who should specifically be targeted for Public Comment feedback
    • Was the profile where it needed to be at the start of the PC meeting (See "PC Prep Meeting" above), if not what was the gap
    • Was the profile where it needed to be at the end of the PC meeting, if not what was the gap
    • How many tcons would you like between now and PC Publication
    • Do you need any tcons before TI Prep Meeting

For sample evaluations see: Rad_Tech_Minutes_2017-02-28_to_2017-03-03

Annex: TI-Prep Closing Assessment

  • Paste the following checklist items into the minutes; discuss and record findings for each
    • Did we line-by-line the entire document
    • How ready is it to go out for TI: Completely, Almost, Soonish, Hmmm
    • How did the work fit in the allocated bandwidth? (Time to spare? Just right? Things were left undone?)
    • Review the evaluation. Which complexity/uncertainty/effort points missed the mark?
    • Or alternatively, estimate how many points you went over and assign the overage effort/complexity/uncertainty to the appropriate points.
    • Are all the open issues closed?
    • What significant debates in TI-prep were not anticipated in the Kickoff or PC-Prep
    • Did the Breakdown of Tasks accurately reflect the work? What extra tasks arose?
    • What residual risks are worth noting
    • Does it feel we've met all the use cases
    • Did the promised resources manifest
    • What vendors are engaged (for each actor)
    • Who should specifically be targeted for TI notification (implementors & advocates)
    • When will we have sample data/objects
    • Was the profile where it needed to be at the start of the TI meeting, if not what was the gap
    • Was the profile where it needed to be at the end of the TI meeting, if not what was the gap
    • Do you need any tcons between now and TI Publication
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