[Proposal] Rename "gender" to "sex"

[ablack3]

trafficstars

In the next set of breaking changes (major release) we might consider renaming "gender" columns to "sex" columns.

I think the use case would be any study that involves the concept of gender identity because that would require making a distinction between gender identity and biological sex. If no-one want to use this in studies then it might not be worth making the breaking change though.

[cgreich]

Apart from the nomenclature, which is in conflict how these things are called these days (wasn't there 10 years ago): What use case are we solving? Today, we can both represent the sex (in PERSON) and the gender (in OBSERVATION). Do we really want to make a breaking change only for nomenclature purposes?

[ablack3]

Good point. Does anyone have a use case that requires this change?

[clairblacketer]

There is no specific use case I am aware of apart from using current terminology. We have talked about this issue for many moons but I think the software repercussions are significant and do not necessarily warrant the change.

[ablack3]

Ok good to know. How does the proposal triage process work?

[clarkevans]

This remains an important issue.

[bnhamlin]

1. The term "gender_concept_id" should be renamed to "birthsex_concept_id" to align with the HL7 and ONC concept definitions & nomenclature for recorded Gender Identify (GI) and Recorded Sex and Gender (RSG) concepts.
2. OMOP "Sex assigned at Birth" is currently a non-standard observation [LOINC LP307612-4] and this element belongs in the patient table (not obs)
3. The OMOP "birthsex_concepot_id" should add "Unknown" to align with the ONC certification value set (2015 Edition) for birth sex that use (1) M ("Male"), (2) F ("Female"), (3) UNK ("Unknown")

Gender_FHIR_OMOP_Harmonization (1).pptx