Group

Last updated: 14 Sep 2026

Introduction #

The Group model gives you the stable external identifier Canvas uses to expose a Team or a PatientGroup as a single FHIR resource, so you can move between an SDK record and its FHIR representation without tracking a separate identifier yourself.

A Group is a stable external identifier that Canvas attaches through a generic relation — the content_type and object_id fields, the same pattern OrganizationalEntity uses — to either a Team or a PatientGroup, the record this reference calls the Group’s content object. This identifier is exactly what the FHIR Group endpoint exposes as its id. A Team surfaces as a FHIR Group of type practitioner, and a PatientGroup surfaces as a FHIR Group of type person.

Reach for Group when you hold a FHIR Group id — the stable external identifier — and need to resolve which SDK record it names, a Team or a PatientGroup. When you already have a Team in hand, its group_id is the shorter path, because it exposes the FHIR Group id directly.

Group exposes the linked record through typed property accessors, and the Group record itself is read-only; create or update the underlying FHIR Group through the FHIR API rather than an SDK effect.

Basic usage #

To follow a Group to the record it points at, retrieve the Group by id and read whichever typed property is set:

from canvas_sdk.v1.data import Group

group = Group.objects.get(id="d2194110-5c9a-4842-8733-ef09ea5ead11")

if group.team is not None:
    linked = group.team
elif group.patient_group is not None:
    linked = group.patient_group
else:
    linked = None

For a Group whose content object is a Team, team returns the linked Team and patient_group is None. For a Group whose content object is a PatientGroup, patient_group returns the linked PatientGroup and team is None. When a Group is not backed by either type, both properties return None, so read whichever property is set rather than assuming one always resolves.

Attributes #

Group #

Field Name	Type
id	UUID
dbid	Integer
created	DateTime
modified	DateTime
content_type	ContentType
object_id	Integer

The object_id field holds the target record’s dbid — its internal integer identifier — rather than its id UUID.

Only two kinds of record get a Group, so content_type.model is always one of these two values. Read it to tell which one a Group points at, or use the typed properties below, which do the same check for you.

content_type.model	Content object
team	Team
patientgroup	PatientGroup

Properties #

Name	Type	Description
team	Team | None	The Team this group points at, or None when its content object is not a Team.
patient_group	PatientGroup | None	The PatientGroup this group points at, or None when its content object is not a PatientGroup.