Micheal
I have done just what you describe in VB, both VB6, then ported to VB.Net.
I had trouble deploying the latter, and have many more years (of course) with VB6, so I went back to my VB6 code recently.
I parse HL7 files from our hospital lab, and plug into an Access MDB. I plan to move that lab table to a more robust DB engine (MySQL, SLQ Express or Advantage) "real soon now", as soon as I have extra time.
The kicker is, you have to either write code for each lab source, or preferably use a look up table, as a "Hgb" in 1 HL7 file for lab A may be "Hb" or "Hemoglobin" in another. The HL7 "standard" is a framework, and doesn't define names of data elements. If however, the Lab HL7 includes LOINC codes, then you can use the LOINC code for the test to put into the field of your database for Hgb, regardless of what the lab "calls" it.
But you are in fact writing an interface.
I did so in Dataflex for DOS in 1990, first with ATSM files from SmithKLine Labs, then from our hospital lab, so use the language with which you are familar as long as it runs on your system and can handle string parsing well.
Good luck.
