Survivorship logic
Definition
Survivorship logic is the set of rules that decides which value to keep when different sources disagree about the same provider, for example two different phone numbers, so that one trusted record, sometimes called the golden record, survives.
By the Candor Health team
Last reviewed
Also called golden record and survivorship rules
Why is it needed?
Provider data comes from rosters, attestations, registries and claims, and they rarely agree. Without clear rules, the last file loaded wins, even if it was the least reliable.
How do survivorship rules decide?
By weighing how trustworthy each source is for each field, how recent it is, and whether independent sources agree. A phone number confirmed by recent activity beats one from an old form.
Where does it fit?
It comes after record matching (working out that two records are the same provider) and before the result is published to the directory.