Licensing of SNOMED CT
Whilst the principle is to issue royalty-free licences for the use of SNOMED CT throughout IHTSDO Member Territories, there are commercial licensing issues in respect of SNOMED CT. Users of SNOMED CT need to obtain licences for its use as follows:
NHS staff & non supplier stakeholders
NHS staff using a SNOMED CT embedded application provided by an NHS supplier DO NOT need a licence to use SNOMED CT if the supplier has received a sub-licence from the UKTC. The UKTC sub-licence provides royalty free licences to NHS and healthcare related organisations for access to SNOMED CT for research and development purposes.
Affiliate licences
Developers of SNOMED CT enabled systems, individuals and organisations using SNOMED CT for research purposes within the UK must enter into an agreement with the International Health Terminology Standards Development Organisation (IHTSDO).
They must become 'Affiliates' in terms of licence prior to accessing any part of the UK Edition of the SNOMED CT release. In the UK this can be done via the UK Terminology Centre (UKTC).
Once becoming an Affiliate, SNOMED CT can be used for any purposes in the UK without a fee being payable.
If the intention is to deploy SNOMED CT outside of the IHTSDO territories please refer to the join us page on the IHTSDO website.
Suppliers
Any company selling a product in the UK which has SNOMED CT embedded within it must have a UK sub-licence from the UKTC prior to selling the product in the UK. This applies even if the company is registered in another IHTSDO member country.
When selling the SNOMED CT embedded product to another IHTSDO member country, the company will need to obtain the appropriate licence from that individual country prior to sale. Find IHTSDO member countries and contacts.
Licensing enquiries
For all SNOMED CT licensing enquiries please contact the UKTC via the NHS Data Standards and Products Helpdesk at datastandards@nhs.net. Tel: 00 44 01392 206248.