Standards Version Advancement Process

ONC has established the voluntary Standards Version Advancement Process (SVAP)¹ to enable health IT developers’ ability to incorporate newer versions of Secretary-adopted standards and implementation specifications, as part of the “Real World Testing” Condition and Maintenance of Certification requirement (§ 170.405) of the 21st Century Cures Act.  

Using SVAP, certified health IT developers are permitted to voluntarily use a more advanced version of the standard(s) and implementation specification(s) approved by the National Coordinator than is adopted in the ONC 2015 Edition Certification Criteria. Currently, this flexibility is limited to standards and implementation specifications that are adopted in the certification criteria required to meet “Real World Testing” condition of certification, which include § 170.315(b), (c)(1) through (c)(3), (e)(1), (f), (g)(7) through (g)(10), and (h).

Health IT developers taking advantage of the SVAP flexibility must ensure that their real-world testing plans and results of the certified health modules use these updated standards and implementation specifications. Additionally, certified health IT developers are required to provide advance notice to their clients and their ONC-Authorized Certification Body (ONC-ACB) before adopting the new standards.

Working with industry stakeholders and providing ample notice, ONC will follow a collaborative process to identify a more advanced version of the standards or implementation specifications, for approval by the National Coordinator. 

The table below lists the standards and implementation specifications (and their versions) that will be considered for advancement and those that have received National Coordinator approval via the Standards Version Advancement Process. It does not include any minimum vocabulary standards as health IT can continue to be certified or upgraded to newer version(s) of identified minimum standard code sets, unless newer version(s) are explicitly prohibited by the Secretary. The table can be sorted by either "Current Standard/Implementation Specification" or "Regulatory Text Citation" by clicking on the column name.

The table below will be updated throughout the year to include standards with newer versions under consideration for the current SVAP cycle. However, if there is a newer version of a standard and it’s not listed below it can still be considered for inclusion in the current SVAP cycle. As with previous SVAP cycles, future public comment periods will align with important standards development activities, such as the yearly release of new United States Core Data for Interoperability (USCDI) versions and HL7® standards related to C-CDA® and FHIR® US Core, thereby establishing a consistent cadence of SVAP comment periods and releases. The yearly SVAP comment cycle is open from January to May with a final release of SVAP approved standards for each year to occur in June. The public comment period for SVAP 2024 will run from January 16 through May 21 at 11:59 PM ET. 

For the latest information on the approved standards for use, see the ONC Health IT Certification Program SVAP page.