OMOP Odyssey - GCP Healthcare API Real Time FHIR® to OMOP Transformation (RealTymus)

Welcome to RealTymus. In this stage of the Odyssey, we’re pushing the boundaries of data velocity. We’ve automated batch exports, but now we want to transform healthcare events as they happen. We’re using the GCP Healthcare API, Pub/Sub, and Cloud Functions to create a real-time bridge to the InterSystems OMOP Cloud Service.

The Architecture: Event-Driven Transformation

The core idea is simple: every time a FHIR resource is created or updated in the GCP Healthcare API, it triggers a notification. Our pipeline catches that notification and immediately kicks off the transformation to OMOP.

Step One: Pub/Sub Subscription

We configure our GCP FHIR store to publish events to a Pub/Sub topic. Our Cloud Function is subscribed to this topic, waiting for incoming data events.

Step Two: Exporting to GCS

When an event occurs, the Cloud Function triggers an export of the specific resource (or the entire store for small datasets) to a Google Cloud Storage (GCS) bucket.

Step Three: Bridging the Clouds

Once the data is in GCS, our Cloud Function creates a ZIP archive and pushes it directly to the ingestion S3 bucket of the InterSystems OMOP Cloud Service on AWS.

Step Four: InterSystems Transformation

InterSystems picks up the event-driven ZIP and immediately transforms the FHIR resources into the target OMOP CDM.

Step Five: Immediate Validation

We can verify the transformation instantly. A FHIR Organization resource created in GCP is now available as a care_site in our OMOP CDM.

When did that transformation happen? Now. Everything that’s happening now is happening now.

Conclusion

By leveraging event-driven cloud native services, we’ve reduced the latency between clinical events and analytical readiness to near real-time. This opens up incredible possibilities for real-time population health monitoring and clinical decision support.

The journey through RealTymus is complete. The Odyssey continues…