Connect to Live FHIR Data in MicroStrategy through CData Connect Cloud

Configure FHIR Connectivity for Microstrategy

Connectivity to FHIR from Microstrategy is made possible through CData Connect Cloud. To work with FHIR data from Microstrategy, we start by creating and configuring a FHIR connection.

Log into Connect Cloud, click Connections and click Add Connection

Select "FHIR" from the Add Connection panel

Enter the necessary authentication properties to connect to FHIR.

Set URL to the Service Base URL of the FHIR server. This is the address where the resources are defined in the FHIR server you would like to connect to. Set ConnectionType to a supported connection type. Set ContentType to the format of your documents. Set AuthScheme based on the authentication requirements for your FHIR server.

Generic, Azure-based, AWS-based, and Google-based FHIR server implementations are supported.

Sample Service Base URLs

Generic: http://my_fhir_server/r4b/
Azure: https://MY_AZURE_FHIR.azurehealthcareapis.com/
AWS: https://healthlake.REGION.amazonaws.com/datastore/DATASTORE_ID/r4/
Google: https://healthcare.googleapis.com/v1/projects/PROJECT_ID/locations/LOCATION/datasets/DATASET_ID/fhirStores/FHIR_STORE_ID/fhir/

Generic FHIR Instances

The product supports connections to custom instances of FHIR. Authentication to custom FHIR servers is handled via OAuth (read more about OAuth in the Help documentation. Before you can connect to custom FHIR instances, you must set ConnectionType to Generic.

Configuring a connection (Salesforce is showe)

Click Create & Test

Navigate to the Permissions tab in the Add FHIR Connection page and update the User-based permissions.

Add a Personal Access Token

If you are connecting from a service, application, platform, or framework that does not support OAuth authentication, you can create a Personal Access Token (PAT) to use for authentication. Best practices would dictate that you create a separate PAT for each service, to maintain granularity of access.

Click on your username at the top right of the Connect Cloud app and click User Profile.

Oa the User Profile page, scroll down to the Personal Access Tokens section and click Create PAT.

Give your PAT a name and click Create.

The personal access token is only visible at creation, so be sure to copy it and store it securely for future use.

With the connection configured, you are ready to connect to FHIR data from MicroStrategy.

Connect to and Visualize FHIR Data Using MicroStrategy

You can connect to FHIR in MicroStrategy by adding a data source based on the native SQL Server functionality. Once you have created a data source, you can build dynamic visualizations of FHIR data in MicroStrategy.

Open MicroStrategy and select your account.

Click Add External Data, select Databases, and use Select Tables as the Import Option.

In the Import from Tables wizard, click to add a new Data Source.

Select "SQL Server" in the Database menu and select "SQL Server 2017" in the Version menu.

Sat the connection properties as follows:

Server Name: tds.cdata.com
Port Number: 14333
Database Name: the name of your FHIR connection (e.g. FHIR1)
User: a Connect Cloud user
Password: the PAT for your Connect Cloud user
Data Source Name: a name for the new external data source, like "CData Cloud FHIR"

Expand the menu for the new data source and choose "Edit Catalog Options"

Edit the "SQL statement retrieve columns ..." query to include TABLE_SCHEMA = '#?Schema_Name?#' in the WHERE clause, and click Apply and then OK (the complete query is below).

SELECT DISTINCT 
  TABLE_SCHEMA NAME_SPACE, 
  TABLE_NAME TAB_NAME, 
  COLUMN_NAME COL_NAME, 
  (CASE 
    WHEN 
      (DATA_TYPE LIKE '%char' AND (CHARACTER_SET_NAME='utf8' OR CHARACTER_SET_NAME='usc2')) 
    THEN 
      CONCAT('a',DATA_TYPE) 
    ELSE 
      DATA_TYPE 
  END) DATA_TYPE, 
  CHARACTER_MAXIMUM_LENGTH DATA_LEN, 
  NUMERIC_PRECISION DATA_PREC, 
  NUMERIC_SCALE DATA_SCALE 
FROM 
  INFORMATION_SCHEMA.COLUMNS 
WHERE 
  TABLE_NAME 
IN 
  (#TABLE_LIST#) AND TABLE_SCHEMA='#?Schema_Name?#' 
ORDER BY 
  1,2,3

Select the new data source and select the Namespace that corresponds to your virtual FHIR database (like FHIR1).

Drag tables into the pane to insert then.

Note: Since we create a live connection, we can insert whole tables and utilize the filtering and aggregation features native to the MicroStrategy products to customize our datasets.

Click Finish, choose the option to connect live, save the query, and choose the option to create a new dossier. Live connections are possible and effective, thanks to high-performance data processing native to CData Connect Cloud.

Save the query and create a new dossier.

Choose a visualization, choose fields to display, and apply any filters to create a new visualization of FHIR data. Data types are discovered automatically through dynamic metadata discovery. Where possible, the complex queries generated by the filters and aggregations will be pushed down to FHIR, while any unsupported operations (which can include SQL functions and JOIN operations) will be managed by the CData SQL engine embedded in Connect Cloud.

Once you have finished configuring the dossier, click File -> Save.

Using CData Connect Cloud with MicroStrategy, you can easily create robust visualizations and reports on FHIR data. For more information on connecting to FHIR (and more than 100 other data sources), visit the Connect Cloud page. Sign up for a free trial and start working with live FHIR data in MicroStrategy.

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