Sun Match Engine Person Matching Overview

Matching on the person data type includes standardizing and matching a person’s demographic information. The Sun Match Engine can create normalized and phonetic values for person data. Several configuration files designed specifically to handle person data are included to provide additional logic for the standardization and phonetic encoding process. The Sun Match Engine can phonetically encode any field you specify, with some modification to the standardization files. It can also match on any field, as long as the match type for the field is defined in the match configuration file (matchConfigFile.cfg).

In addition, when storing person information, you might want to standardize addresses to enable searching against address information. This requires working with the address configuration files described in Sun Match Engine Address Data Type Configuration.

The following topic provides information about the fields used in person data matching and the fields added to the object structure.

• Sun Match Engine Person Data Processing Fields

Sun Match Engine Person Data Processing Fields

When matching on person data, not all fields in a record need to be processed by the Sun Match Engine. The match engine only needs to process fields that must be parsed, normalized, or phonetically converted, and the fields against which matching is performed. These fields are defined in the Match Field file and processing logic for each field is defined in the Sun Match Engine standardization and matching configuration files.

Person Data Match String Fields

The match string processed by the Sun Match Engine is defined by the match fields specified in the Match Field file. The match engine can process any combination of fields you specify for matching. By default, the match configuration file (matchConfigFile.cfg) includes rows specifically for matching on first name, last name, social security number, and dates (such as a date of birth). It also includes a row for matching a single character, such as might be the case in a gender field. You can use any of the existing rows for matching or you can add rows for the fields you want to match. Any field for which you specify a match type in the wizard is added to the match string.

Person Data Standardized Fields

The Sun Match Engine expects person data to be provided in separate fields within a single record, meaning that no parsing is required of the name fields prior to normalization. Typically, only first and last names are normalized and phonetically encoded when standardizing person date, but the match engine can normalize and phonetically encode any field you choose.

Person Data Object Structure

The fields you specify for person name matching in the wizard are automatically defined for standardization and phonetic encoding. If you specify the appropriate match types in the wizard, the following fields are automatically added to the object structure and database creation script.

• field_name_Std

• field_name_Phon

where field_name is the name of the field for which you specified person name matching. For example, if you specify the PersonFirstName match type for the FirstName field, two fields, FirstName_Std and FirstName_Phon, are automatically added to the structure. You can also add these fields manually if you do not specify match types in the wizard. If you store additional names in the database, such as alias names, maiden names, parent names, and so on, you can modify the phonetic structure to phonetically encode those names as well.

The object structure for Sun Master Patient Index uses a slightly different naming convention. For the names of the fields defined for Sun Master Patient Index, refer to the Sun Patient Master Index Configuration Options.