Is the MessageHeader resource intended to be transient in messaging workflow? That seems to be implicitly understood in some quarters but isn't explicitly stated in this module so we would appreciate clarification on that point. SHOULD a message receiver throw away the MessageHeader after processing the message?

I discussed FHIR-40264 with lloyd and he thinks that a reason to remove certain elements from MessageHeader is that resource type is transient. The receiver may throw it away after processing the message and isn't expected to persist it. Thus any metadata which does need to be persisted by the receiver should be moved into separate Task resources. If we do go that route then we would at least need more detailed documentation and examples showing how to use Task for that case. There may also be differences between persisting message metadata for auditing and reporting purposes versus for clinical care.

We might want a joint discussion between FHIR-I and InM before making a decision on this issue since FHIR-I owns the Messaging module and InM owns the MessageHeader resource type. Depending on the outcome of this issue a separate issue might be needed for MessageHeader.

Tagging RikiM in case she wants to add additional comments.