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Ask HN: Recommendations for forum software for surgeons to discuss cases

by capnahab on 11/25/21, 7:36 AM with 6 comments

I need to set up a secure forum for doctors to discuss various apsects of neurosurgery. This is a specialty with many rare types of tumour and a platform to share learning and ask advice would be very helpful. This is mainly community support for surgeons in different stages of training. There is good advice from the UK General Medical Council (https://www.gmc-uk.org/ethical-guidance/ethical-guidance-for-doctors/doctors-use-of-social-media/doctors-use-of-social-media)

The main minimum requirements are

Moderated - no patient id's

Secure 2FA

Heavy image upload (mainly screenshots of radiology Images - MR scans) Annotation would be good but a big ask

Inexpensive

Archiveable

Legal disclaimer etc

There is already a decent forum at doctors.net.uk but we could not use this as it does not allow image upload and we could not easily set up subforums.

The image load could become expensive and cost is a concern. Thanks for any tips.

  • by thuccess129 on 11/25/21, 9:16 AM

    Discourse software may work for you in your area of concern and customers. [A] Integrating on the fly annotations to image store for large important data set isn't a new problem that hasn't already been solved. Networking and storage is cheap. Look for expert cloud infrastructure provider specialising in the medical field? Expect a little bit of premium on pricing above services from namecheap.com? [B]

    A. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discourse_(software) B. https://namecheap.com

  • by dredmorbius on 11/25/21, 7:57 AM

    What is your budget?

    Overall, per user, per patient.

    What regulatory jurisdiction are you under? US, EU, UK, etc., all have sharply differing concerns.

    You'll need a legal advisor to determine what information can and cannot be exchanged. Note that "no patient IDs" doesn't mean that cases aren't identifiable. Diagnosis and timing information are themselves sufficient in many instances, any additional information (the classic ASL --- age, sex, and location --- would also strongly reduce search space). You're working against 33 bits:

    https://33bits.wordpress.com/about/

  • by holler on 11/25/21, 7:45 AM

    Is it something you're willing to pay for or looking for opensource?