The VISIT_DETAIL table is an optional table used to represents details of each record in the parent visit_occurrence table. For every record in visit_occurrence table there may be 0 or more records in the visit_detail table with a 1:n relationship where n may be 0. The visit_detail table is structurally very similar to visit_occurrence table and belongs to the similar domain as the visit. 


Field|Required|Type|Description
:------------------------|:--------|:-----|:-------------------------------------------------
|visit_detail_id|Yes|integer|A unique identifier for each Person's visit or encounter at a healthcare provider.|
|person_id|Yes|integer|A foreign key identifier to the Person for whom the visit is recorded. The demographic details of that Person are stored in the PERSON table.|
|visit_detail_concept_id|Yes|integer|A foreign key that refers to a visit Concept identifier in the Standardized Vocabularies.|
|visit_start_date|Yes|date|The start date of the visit.|
|visit_start_datetime|No|datetime|The date and time of the visit started.|
|visit_end_date|Yes|date|The end date of the visit. If this is a one-day visit the end date should match the start date.|
|visit_end_datetime|No|datetime|The date and time of the visit end.|
|visit_type_concept_id|Yes|Integer|A foreign key to the predefined Concept identifier in the Standardized Vocabularies reflecting the type of source data from which the visit record is derived.|
|provider_id|No|integer|A foreign key to the provider in the provider table who was associated with the visit.|
|care_site_id|No|integer|A foreign key to the care site in the care site table that was visited.|
|visit_source_value|No|string(50)|The source code for the visit as it appears in the source data.|
|visit_source_concept_id|No|Integer|A foreign key to a Concept that refers to the code used in the source.|
|admitting_source_value	|Varchar(50)|	No|	The source code for the admitting source as it appears in the source data.|
|admitting_source_concept_id	|Integer	|No	|A foreign key to the predefined concept in the Place of Service Vocabulary reflecting the admitting source for a visit.|
|discharge_to_source_value|	Varchar(50)|	No|	The source code for the discharge disposition as it appears in the source data.|
|discharge_to_concept_id|	Integer	|No	|A foreign key to the predefined concept in the Place of Service Vocabulary reflecting the discharge disposition for a visit.|
|preceding_visit_detail_id	|Integer|	No	|A foreign key to the VISIT_DETAIL table of the visit immediately preceding this visit|
|visit_detail_parent_id	|Integer|	No	|A foreign key to the VISIT_DETAIL table record to represent the immediate parent visit-detail record.|
|visit_occurrence_id	|Integer|	Yes	|A foreign key that refers to the record in the VISIT_OCCURRENCE table. This is a required field, because for every visit_detail is a child of visit_occurrence and cannot exist without a corresponding parent record in visit_occurrence.|

### Conventions 

  * All conventions used in Visit occurrence apply to visit detail, some notable exceptions:
  * A Visit Detail is an optional detail record for each visit-occurrence to a healthcare facility. For every record in visit_detail there has to be a parent visit_occurrence record.
  * One record is visit_detail can only have one visit_occurrence parent.
  * A single visit_occurrence record may have many child visit_detail records.
  * Valid Visit Concepts belong to the "Visit" domain. Standard Visit Concepts are yet to be defined, but will represent a detail of the standard visit concept in visit-occurrence.
  * Handling of death: Is same as visit_occurrence
  * Source Concepts from place of service vocabularies are mapped into these standard visit Concepts in the Standardized Vocabularies. 
  * At any one day, there could be more than one visit. Visit_occurrence allows for more than one visit within single day. Visit_detail is to be used to only capture details within the visit_occurrence.
  * One visit may involve multiple providers, in which case, in visit_occurrence, the ETL must specify how a single provider id is selected or leave the provider_id field null. Visit_detail allows for ETL to speicify multiple child records per visit_occurrence - and each of these child may represent different provider_ids.
  * One visit may involve multiple Care Sites, in which case, in visit_occurrence, the ETL must specify how a single care_site id is selected or leave the care_site_id field null. Visit_detail allows for ETL to speicify multiple child records per visit_occurrence - and each of these child may represent different care_sites.
  * Just like in visit_occurrence, records in visit_detail may be sequentially related to each. These sequential relations are represented using preceding_visit_detail_id
  * Unlike visit_occurrence, visit_detail may have nested visits with hierarchial relationships to each other. 
  * Representation of US claim data: US claims data generally has two-levels. Header/summary data that summarizes the entire claim; Line/detail that details a claim. Detail is thus a child of the summary, and for every record in summary there is one or more records in detail. i.e. there will be atleast one FK link from visit_detail to visit_occurrence.
 
 Example: an entire inpatient stay maybe one record in visit_occurrence table. This may have one or more detail information such as ER, ICU, medical floor, rehabilitation floor etc. Each of these visit_details may have different start/end date-times, different concept_id's and fact_id's - that would be separate record in visit_detail with a FK link to visit_occurrence. Each record within visit_detail maybe related to each other, sequentially –> ER leading to ICU leading to medical floor, leading to rehabilitation, or in hierarchical parent-child visit –> a visit for dialysis while in ICU.

Note the concept-id for visits is 9, and is shared between visit_occurrence and visit_detail in OMOP CDM. The key deviation from visit_occurrence is
- self-referencing key: a new foreign key visit_detail_parent_id allows self referencing for nested visits.
- visit_detail points to its parent record in visit_occurrence table (visit_occurrence_id)