On October 10, the LOINC 2025 Conference 
in Montreal, Canada hosted a group discussion on the incorporation of social determinants of health data. This included discussion of the Gravity Project and the International Patient Summary (IPS).
Growing international demand for Gravity’s social determinants of health (SDOH) standards has highlighted the need for a more inclusive and globally coordinated approach, especially as countries look for frameworks like the IPS that balance global consistency with local adaptability. Participants from multiple regions emphasized that although many nations seek to implement SDOH standards, they lack a structured way to collaborate with Gravity, resulting in uneven input and fragmented implementations. The IPS model was repeatedly cited as a successful precedent; it demonstrates how international governance, broad stakeholder participation, and globally defined core content can create a widely adopted standard that still accommodates national constraints. Similarly, stakeholders called for an international SDOH standard that is not just an “extension” of U.S. work but is instead intentionally co designed, culturally aware, privacy protective, and grounded in shared global concepts while allowing localized tailoring through constraints rather than divergent extensions.
Participants also noted that Gravity’s foundational use of international classifications, such as SNOMED Clinical Terminology, and its current processes position it well to support a globally coordinated SDOH framework inspired by the IPS governance. To achieve this, stakeholders recommended:- Establishing an international collaboration,
- Developing a globally agreed upon target state and roadmap,
- Prioritizing use case-driven development and real-world examples from multiple countries,
- Elevating diverse perspectives including from low-and-middle income countries,
- Ensuring strong alignment with existing standards and global bodies such as World Health Organization (WHO) and the Global Digital Health Partnership (GDHP)
Consistent with lessons from the IPS, they stressed that globally relevant SDOH standards must prioritize data justice, privacy, sensitive data protections, and real world use cases such as cross border care and pandemic response, ensuring both ethical and practical value as international SDOH integration accelerates.