Heather, thanks for full reply.
Yes, looks like its the scale/score authors that I am criticising, such as the Borg scale.
But the new DV_SCALE I am unclear about, as it “allows us to handle real number rather than just integers” Clinical scales - ordinal or coded text? - #18 by ian.mcnicoll
I understand that integers are already real numbers , the issue was to support fractional numbers like 2.5.
But I think that both 2 and 2.5 here (in Borg) are not real numbers either: these ordinal numbers are all not simply calculable despite appearances.
So should the datatype be non-calculable i.e. DV_CODED_TEXT ?
If the scale author is using ordinal numbers badly, should openEHR persist this error by allowing it to compute as if a real number?