SDC-based intake forms in clinical workflows use five design patterns.
Pattern 1: Pre-visit patient completion. Delivered 24-48 hours before visit; QuestionnaireResponse feeds check-in.
Pattern 2: Pre-population from FHIR. Known Patient data pulled from FHIR store.
Pattern 3: Multi-page navigation. Long forms grouped into pages.
Pattern 4: Conditional item visibility. enableWhen and enableWhenExpression.
Pattern 5: Server-side $extract. Structured resources produced from responses.
Completion rate impact
| Design | Impact |
|---|---|
| Time estimate | Baseline |
| Pre-population | +15-20 pp |
| Mobile-first | +10-15 pp |
| Save-resume | +10 pp long forms |
| Progress indicator | +3-5 pp |
Vendor state
| Renderer | Full features | Mobile UX |
|---|---|---|
| Aidbox Formbox | Yes | Excellent |
| LHC-Forms | Yes | Good |
| Smile CDR SDC | Yes | Good |
| Custom HTML | Depends | Depends |
Common mistakes
1. No pre-population. 2. Desktop-first UX on mobile. 3. No save-and-resume. 4. Manual downstream integration. 5. Runtime terminology latency.
Deployment considerations
1. Test on real devices. 2. Save-and-resume across sessions. 3. Cache terminology at load. 4. Progress indicators throughout. 5. Accessibility testing.
SDC intake forms deliver value proportional to design quality. The five patterns above cover most productive deployments.