On: Hospitals lift curtain on prices, revealing giant ...

[mulmen]

Pipes are commonly used as delimiters in healthcare settings [1]. A quick quack suggests Python, Javascript and Perl ecosystems have HL7 parsing libraries available. I assume most languages do.

[1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_Level_7

[batty_alex → mulmen]

Yep, probably an HL7 message. In the case of vertical bars, pretty sure it's HL7v2

[KarlKemp → mulmen]

Except they usually call them “tubes”.

(Can’t find the original source, but it goes “Cant breathe? Put in a tube. Can't pee? Tube. Can't poop? Tube. Bleeding? Tube. Infection? Tube. Heart attack? Tube.”)