Execute a SQLQuery Library against ViewDefinition tables synchronously.

Use Cases:

• Run ad-hoc analytics queries
• Interactive query development and testing
• Real-time data retrieval with parameters

Endpoints:

Execution Flow:

1. Resolve ViewDefinitions from relatedArtifact
2. Materialize each ViewDefinition as a table
3. Bind parameters values to SQL placeholders
4. Execute SQL query
5. Return results in requested format (Binary for flat formats, Parameters for _format=fhir)

Implementations MUST ensure parameter values are safely bound to queries and not subject to SQL injection. Use parameterized queries or equivalent safe binding mechanisms where available. Simple string interpolation MUST NOT be used to implement parameter binding.

URL: [base]/$sqlquery-run

URL: [base]/Library/$sqlquery-run

URL: [base]/Library/[id]/$sqlquery-run

Parameters

Input Parameters

The operation is invoked with POST. The following input parameters are passed inside a Parameters resource in the request body.

¹ Either queryReference or queryResource is required at the system and type levels; neither is allowed at the instance level (the Library is identified by the path).

Output Parameter

Row Limit

When supplied, _limit is the maximum number of rows the server returns to the client.

Servers MAY enforce a maximum value, silently capping client-supplied limits at a smaller server-defined maximum. The cap is applied to the final result set after the SQL query (including any in-query LIMIT) has been evaluated; implementations are free to push the limit down into the query as an optimisation, but the observable behaviour is post-evaluation.

Returning fewer rows than the client requested - whether because the query yielded fewer rows or because the server applied its own cap - is not treated as an error.

Format Parameter Clarification

It is RECOMMENDED to support json, ndjson and csv formats by default. Servers may support other formats, but they should be explicitly documented in the CapabilityStatement.

If _format is omitted, the server SHALL return the result in ndjson format.

Servers MAY honour the HTTP Accept header to negotiate an alternative format when _format is not supplied. When _format is supplied, its value SHALL take precedence over Accept.

Examples

Instance-Level (Library on Server)

When the SQLQuery Library is stored on the server, invoke directly on the instance:

POST /Library/patient-bp-query/$sqlquery-run HTTP/1.1
Content-Type: application/fhir+json

{
  "resourceType": "Parameters",
  "parameter": [
    { "name": "_format", "valueCode": "csv" },
    { "name": "parameters", "resource": {
      "resourceType": "Parameters",
      "parameter": [
        { "name": "patient_id", "valueString": "Patient/123" },
        { "name": "from_date", "valueDate": "2024-01-01" }
      ]
    }}
  ]
}

Type-Level with Reference

Reference a stored Library by URL or relative reference:

POST /Library/$sqlquery-run HTTP/1.1
Content-Type: application/fhir+json

{
  "resourceType": "Parameters",
  "parameter": [
    { "name": "_format", "valueCode": "json" },
    { "name": "queryReference", "valueReference": {
      "reference": "Library/patient-bp-query"
    }},
    { "name": "parameters", "resource": {
      "resourceType": "Parameters",
      "parameter": [
        { "name": "patient_id", "valueString": "Patient/123" }
      ]
    }}
  ]
}

Type-Level with Inline Resource

Pass the SQLQuery Library inline for ad-hoc queries:

POST /Library/$sqlquery-run HTTP/1.1
Content-Type: application/fhir+json

{
  "resourceType": "Parameters",
  "parameter": [
    { "name": "_format", "valueCode": "ndjson" },
    { "name": "queryResource", "resource": {
      "resourceType": "Library",
      "meta": { "profile": ["https://sql-on-fhir.org/ig/StructureDefinition/SQLQuery"] },
      "type": { "coding": [{ "system": "https://sql-on-fhir.org/ig/CodeSystem/LibraryTypesCodes", "code": "sql-query" }] },
      "status": "active",
      "relatedArtifact": [
        { "type": "depends-on", "resource": "https://example.org/ViewDefinition/patient_view", "label": "p" }
      ],
      "content": [{
        "contentType": "application/sql",
        "data": "U0VMRUNUIHAuaWQsIHAubmFtZSBGUk9NIHAgV0hFUkUgcC5hY3RpdmUgPSB0cnVl",
        "extension": [{
          "url": "https://sql-on-fhir.org/ig/StructureDefinition/sql-text",
          "valueString": "SELECT p.id, p.name FROM p WHERE p.active = true"
        }]
      }]
    }}
  ]
}

System-Level

Invoke at the server base without a resource type. This is useful when the server supports SQLQuery Libraries but does not expose them as FHIR Library resources:

POST /$sqlquery-run HTTP/1.1
Content-Type: application/fhir+json

{
  "resourceType": "Parameters",
  "parameter": [
    { "name": "_format", "valueCode": "csv" },
    { "name": "queryReference", "valueReference": {
      "reference": "Library/patient-bp-query"
    }},
    { "name": "parameter", "part": [
      { "name": "name", "valueString": "patient_id" },
      { "name": "value", "valueString": "Patient/123" }
    ]}
  ]
}

Default Format (_format omitted)

When _format is omitted, the server returns the result in ndjson format:

POST /Library/patient-bp-query/$sqlquery-run HTTP/1.1
Content-Type: application/fhir+json

{
  "resourceType": "Parameters",
  "parameter": [
    { "name": "parameters", "resource": {
      "resourceType": "Parameters",
      "parameter": [
        { "name": "patient_id", "valueString": "Patient/123" }
      ]
    }}
  ]
}

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-Type: application/x-ndjson

{"patient_id":"Patient/123","systolic":120,"effective_date":"2024-01-15"}
{"patient_id":"Patient/123","systolic":118,"effective_date":"2024-02-20"}

Capping Result Rows with _limit

Use _limit to ask the server to return at most a given number of rows. The server may return fewer rows if the query yields fewer or if its configured maximum is smaller; see Row Limit for the full semantics.

POST /Library/patient-bp-query/$sqlquery-run HTTP/1.1
Content-Type: application/fhir+json

{
  "resourceType": "Parameters",
  "parameter": [
    { "name": "_format", "valueCode": "csv" },
    { "name": "_limit", "valueInteger": 100 }
  ]
}

Response

For flat formats (csv, json, ndjson, parquet), the response is a Binary:

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-Type: text/csv

patient_id,systolic,effective_date
Patient/123,120,2024-01-15
Patient/123,118,2024-02-20

FHIR Format Response

When _format=fhir, the response is a FHIR Parameters resource with each row as a repeating row parameter.

POST /Library/patient-bp-query/$sqlquery-run HTTP/1.1
Content-Type: application/fhir+json

{
  "resourceType": "Parameters",
  "parameter": [
    { "name": "_format", "valueCode": "fhir" },
    { "name": "parameters", "resource": {
      "resourceType": "Parameters",
      "parameter": [
        { "name": "patient_id", "valueString": "Patient/123" }
      ]
    }}
  ]
}

Response:

{
    "resourceType": "Parameters",
    "parameter": [
        {
            "name": "row",
            "part": [
                { "name": "patient_id", "valueString": "Patient/123" },
                { "name": "systolic", "valueInteger": 120 },
                { "name": "effective_date", "valueDate": "2024-01-15" }
            ]
        },
        {
            "name": "row",
            "part": [
                { "name": "patient_id", "valueString": "Patient/123" },
                { "name": "systolic", "valueInteger": 118 },
                { "name": "effective_date", "valueDate": "2024-02-20" }
            ]
        }
    ]
}

When a query returns zero rows, the response is a Parameters resource with no parameter elements:

{
    "resourceType": "Parameters"
}

SQL to FHIR type mapping

When _format=fhir, each result column must be encoded using a FHIR value[x] type. The following table defines the mapping from ISO/IEC 9075 SQL types to FHIR parameter value types.

SQL NULL values are represented by omitting the corresponding part from the row parameter.

Conversion of REAL, FLOAT, and DOUBLE PRECISION values to valueDecimal may introduce representation artefacts due to the difference between binary and decimal floating point.

TIMESTAMP WITH TIME ZONE values may carry sub-millisecond precision (e.g. microseconds), but FHIR instant supports at most millisecond precision. Implementations SHOULD round to the nearest millisecond when converting to valueInstant.

TIMESTAMP (without time zone) values are converted to valueDateTime without a timezone offset. FHIR dateTime permits values with or without a timezone, so the absence of timezone information is preserved rather than trying to infer a time zone.

ISO/IEC 9075 types not listed in this table (such as INTERVAL, ARRAY, XML, ROW, and MULTISET) are not supported. If a query produces a result column with an unsupported type, the server MUST return a 422 Unprocessable Entity error. Query authors can work around this by casting unsupported types to a supported type within the SQL query.

Parameter Passing

Query parameters are passed as a nested Parameters resource, following the same pattern as the CQL $evaluate operation. See Parameter Types on the SQLQuery profile for the binding rules and the mapping from Library.parameter.type to the value[x] element to use.

Error Handling