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What co-creation/collaborative platforms exist that focus on in-depth medical data and clinical trials?
Hi there! Thank you for your question on co-creation/collaborative platforms that focus on in-depth medical data and clinical trials. The most useful sources in answering this question were Crunchbase and Capterra, which provided information on potential platforms as well as the current status of those platforms and others. The short version is that the following 11 platforms have been found that appear to meet most, if not all, of your requirements: 1) Cochrane, 2) CrowdMed, 3) Gift Surg, 4) InnoCentive (AstroZeneca), 5) Medical Valley Innovation, 6) Medscape Consult, 7) Meplis, 8) OrthoMind, 9) QuantiaMD, 10) radRounds Radiology Network, and 11) United Genomes Project. Below is a deep dive into the research and methodology.
METHODOLOGY
To answer this question, the research involved seeking and reviewing competitors of the companies that you listed in the "What have you already found?" section (e.g. Doximity and Sermo). As such, Doximity and Sermo were both listed the December 2016 Capterra Medical Software Blog article "9 Doctor Social Networking Sites Every Physician Should Know About." In addition to Doximity and Sermo, QuantiaMD and OrthoMind are also included. Also, a November 2015 Klick.com article identified the Medscape Consult mobile app as a director competitor of Sermo and Doximity. Using Sermo's Crunchbase.com profile, the online platform radRounds Radiology Network was also identified as one of its competitors.
Using a similar process, the research also revealed Cochrane, CrowdMed, GIFT-Surg, Innocentive (AstroZeneca), Medical Valley Innovation, Meplis, and United Genome Project as viable competitors, i.e. platforms and social networks that focus on collaborating on long-term treatment development rather than acute diagnoses. For your convenience, I have listed the above platforms and networks as well as their functions in a spreadsheet.
- Cochrane describes itself as "a global independent network of researchers, patients, carers, and people interested in health." The website states that there are approximately 37,000 contributors representing more than 130 countries. The focus of Cochrane is the gathering and summarizing of the highest quality research evidence that can be used in decision making processes related to treatment. Their stated core principles include: collaboration, minimizing bias, ensuring updated information, maintaining quality and accessibility, and working towards continuity.
- Similar to Cochrane, CrowdMed offers a collaborative network that provides patients with expert medical information that can be used when making decisions related to treatment for complex medical cases. The expert medical information comes from what CrowdMed calls its Medical Detectives. Patients are allowed to submit "cases" for Medical Detectives to review and solve. Medical Detectives are able to accept cases to solve. The ultimate goal is to reduce patient costs for treatment by eliminating decisions to have potentially unnecessary treatments.
- GIFT-Surg is a UK-based and Belgium-based collaborative research project by the University College London, University College London, KU Leuven, and UZ Leuven that focuses on tools and therapies for unborn children that are safe and minimally invasive. Specifically, it is focusing on creating flexible surgical instruments, reducing tremor risk, developing MRI and US scans-based computer algorithms, providing real-time visual surgical equipment and relevant computer software that ultimately allows for surgeons to have a better and broader view scope. It is supported by the Wellcome Trust and EPSRC. It is funded by the Cochrane Library, and its partners include World Health Organization, Wikipedia, and AllTrials.
- InnoCentive is the website for AstraZeneca's Open Innovation Pavilion that is described as a collaborative platform that aims to work with "like-minded scientists in academia and organizations" to aid in the development of new medicines that address illnesses that have not received much attention or have not yet received significant medical research into treatment. Ultimately, it hopes to collaborate with multidisciplinary experts who can provide input into the different stages of drug discovery.
- Medical Valley Innovation is a Germany-based "Open Innovation Platform" that welcomes experts from different fields to provide their input into the development of medical products. Specifically, the platform offers users the chance to answer questions related to "sustainable innovation in the field of medical technology" posed by medical companies. From the website, it appears that there may be some type of monetary compensation as well as networking potential for participants.
- Medscape Consult is described as "an online community." In this community, clinical questions are asked and answered by physicians with the aim of creating a space for physicians to share and address challenges they face.
- Like CrowdMed, the focus of Meplis is the lowering of healthcare costs, but also it promotes improved healthcare treatment for patients. Specifically, it examines the distress experienced by users of healthcare systems to identify areas in which behaviors should be modified to ensure accessibility and an overall positive experience that is emotionally, physically, and financially safer for patients. It is a collaborative process that relies on "the public, healthcare professional and organizations" to achieve this goal.
- OrthoMind is a niche platform for orthopedic surgeons that was created by orthopedic surgeons. It describes itself as "Global Practice Network" that offers "customized knowledge distribution" that is both ethically and HIPAA compliant. However, the only people allowed to have access to the OrthoMind's data are its employees or orthopedic surgeons whose credentials have been validated.
- QuantiaMD describes itself as "a web and mobile community for physicians." It offers physicians presentations and discussions on medical trends and research topics by experts while fostering communication between members. The goal is that through this community, physicians will be better equipped and more apt to seek advice from their peers as a part of their practice. Currently, it is partnered with more than 1,000 physician experts, to whom members can submit questions.
10. RADROUNDS RADIOLOGY NETWORK
- radRounds Radiology Network focuses on supporting a network of radiologists and medical imaging professionals to collaborate, network, share ideas and learn from each other about the latest trends in the industry. Although radRounds was created by radiologists, it is open to all medical imaging professionals globally.
- The United Genomes Project is a US-based program that focuses on "developing a comprehensive open genetic database of African populations." The goal is to have a genomic medicine platform that can be used by training students and scientists. The collaborative aspect of this program is that it requests the participation of sharing genetic data.
CONCLUSION
To wrap it up, based upon your question, 11 platforms have been found to meet most, if not all, of your requirements. These platforms have been identified as competitors of the example platforms that you provided. Some of these platforms are specific to niche groups, such as orthopedic surgeons and radiologists. However, many are open to medical professionals globally as well as patients. One of the most useful sources was the 2016 Capterra article "9 Doctor Social Networking Sites Every Physician Should Know About" as it provides information on direct competitors to the examples that you provided. As noted above, I have created a spreadsheet with the information on the platforms, which you may find useful. Thanks for using Wonder! Please, let us know if we can help with anything else!