SMART Web Messaging as a way to communicate events happening inside of a SMART App

[rjfree21]

We're implementing SMART Web Messaging in our Provider Portal (think of it as a CDS focused EHR) and would like to use SMART Web Messaging as a way to communicate events that happen inside of a SMART App back to the portal. We want the user facing elements of our portal to be minimal and delegate as many tasks as possible to SMART Apps and CDS Hooks using SMART Web Messaging as way to help with the orchestration of workflow and information between apps and CDS Hooks cards.

As an example, someone should be able to build a CPOE-type SMART App, register it in our portal, launch the portal, select a patient, launch the CPOE app, fill out an order which then the app uses SMART Web Messaging to notify the portal that the order_sign hook should be triggered. This is in contrast to a SMART app that may want to provide a draft order to the "standard/default" CPOE module and use the ui.LaunchActivity message to navigate and pre-populate an order in that module.

My question is: is that possible/intended with the current ui.LaunchActivity? If not, could we consider adding a new parameter to LaunchActivity to communicate intended/recommended behavior of the EHR/Portal to either "navigate" or "notify"? Or even add a new UI Message Type for this?

[jmandel]

Great question -- and I love the use case. I think this falls under the general scope of what I'd consider an "activity," and would suggest you might experiment with adding a parameter as you've suggested here. If you like how it works, please share a PR and we can get the suggestion merged!

[rjfree21]

Great, we'll share what we come up with.