App Review: Dermatology: Medical Student Edition

The latest in our series of app reviews is a guest post by MBBS student Michelle Warncke. If you are interested in reviewing an app or resources for the blog, please email us at: liaison@sgul.ac.uk                      

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Name: Dermatology: Medical Student Edition

Publisher: British Association of Dermatologists

Devices: Available on Android (version 2.2+) and Apple devices

Other requirements: Requires 10MB of memory.

Tested on:  Lenovo P2

Available from: Google Play and the App Store, although the iOS version is currently being re-coded.

Price: Free

For: Anyone who wants to prepare for their YSKTs, OSCEs, or simply to explore dermatology.

• Main Pros: Simple language, lots of pictures and a wide range of topics.
  
• Main Cons: There could be more practice questions with varied pictures.

Type of Information: Handy guides to clinical examinations, dermatology concepts, and different conditions. Exam preparation help with practice questions including how to describe lesions.

 

One of the most difficult points of dermatology is differentiating rashes and learning how to describe them. This app helps practice just that!

The dermatology app includes sections for learning and for examination preparation.

The learning section includes:

• Basic concepts: Anatomy and physiology.
• Essential clinical skills: How to take a dermatology history, how to do an OSCE style examination, and how to describe any lesions you might find.
• Practical skills: Patient education, written communication, prescribing skills, and clinical examination/investigations.
• Disease profiles: Emergencies, infections, cancers, common problems.
• Management: Topical and oral.

The exam section includes:

• Case scenarios
• Picture quizzes
• 113 randomized questions

This free app is very useful because of how simple and clear it is. Its folders are easy to navigate and ordered logically. The descriptions are relatively free of medical jargon, and any more difficult terms are accompanied by very indicative pictures. These pictures are used again in the practice questions. The rehearsal is helpful in making associations and has made even practice questions on other apps easier.  The British Association of Dermatologists designed this app for both medical students and junior doctors, and we can definitely see ourselves using it as a refresher on clinics or on the wards in our foundation years.

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Thanks again to Michelle Warncke for writing this review. Please note, all app reviews on this blog are subject to St George’s Library mobile resources disclaimer. Please take the time to read it carefully.

Quick Look: NICE Guidance

*Update – 8th November 2018*

The NICE guidance app is now in the process of being phased out, with a view to it being withdrawn by the 31st December 2018. More information from NICE can be found here.

Name: NICE Guidance

Publisher: National Institute for Health and Care Excellence

Devices:
Android: requires Android 4.0 and up.
iPhone/iPad: iOS 6.0 or later. App size: 5.8MB
*We tested this on an iPad*

Available from:      Google Play , iTunes and Windows

Price: Free

Type of information:  The app provides mobile access to NICE guidelines for healthcare professionals and students. The evidence-based guidelines offer current pathways for the diagnoses, prognosis and treatment of many health problems. There are hundreds of conditions and diseases covered, as well as different public health topics.

Main pros: 

• Easy to use
• Clean interface
• Official guidelines from NICE
• Handy mobile tool

Main cons:  

• Text heavy
• Limited personalisation features

The updated NICE Guidance app from the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence offers on-the-move guidance for healthcare professionals and students. With over 760 topics and guidelines, as well as thousands of individual chapters, the app is text heavy. However, the in-app search box makes it easy to extract information quickly. The app also allows users to browse by topic and by guideline type.

The app is available through NICE and provides access to official NICE evidence-based guidelines which are used to keep health and social care professionals up-to-date on pathways in diagnosing and treating health problems. The information within the app is of a high-quality. Sections include clinical guidelines, cancer service guidelines and public health guidelines. One of the most beneficial features is the new and updated guidance section. New guidelines will automatically update on your device to keep you informed of any developments within healthcare guidelines.

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The app’s interface is uncluttered and easily navigable. You can also personalise the app, although these features are limited. Individual chapters can be bookmarked for use offline, which is useful for keeping track of specialist areas of interest. However, the text cannot be highlighted or annotated.

This app is a good aid for speedy and accurate guidance for the busy healthcare worker, but don’t expect more than what it says on the tin. Overall, the app is intuitive and easy to use and could be a handy mobile tool to have in your pocket!

All posts on this blog are subject to the St George’s Library Disclaimer, please take the time to read it carefully.

Updated: Aug 2017

 

Quick Look: Forest: Stay Focused

We’re very happy to have a guest review by MBBS student and Learning Advocate, Ele Clancey. If you are interested in reviewing an app for the blog, please email liaison@sgul.ac.uk.

Name: Forest: Stay Focused

Publisher: Forestapp.cc

Devices: Available to download on smartphones, android, windows phone and IOS. Can also be downloaded via Chrome and Firefox as apps/add-ons.  The Android app version was tested on a Nexus tablet.

Available from: Play Store, Apple Store, Chrome, Firefox.

Price: Android version – free, there are in app purchases. IOS version – £1.99

Type of information: Forest helps you to put down your phone and focus on your work.

For: Anyone who wants help staying focused on a task.

• Main pros – you get to choose how long your break is following a 25 minute study session
• Main cons – on the free version, there are ads each time you have grown a tree

Ever find yourself taking a quick phone break, only to look up 20 minutes later still scrolling through Facebook? Then Forest could be the app for you.

Forest is an app for those of us that need a bit of help staying focused during a study session. You simply plant a seed when you’re ready to start working and in the next 25 minutes it grows from a sapling to a mature tree. There’s one catch – if you click away from the app, the tree dies.

This app is a simple way of getting an uninterrupted 25 minutes of work done at a time. You can choose in the settings whether the tree dies if you click away from the screen. This is useful if you download it on a tablet, and need to use your device for studying. However, I would suggest that downloading it on your phone and selecting the option where you can’t click away from the screen yields best results.

Of course, the aim is to grow not just a tree, but a forest each day. You are able to track your progress and earn points for the number of trees you grow. Once you reach enough points, different kinds of trees become available to you. While you’re studying, motivational sentences scroll across the top of the tree encouraging you to keep going – it may surprise you how many lapses of concentration you have!

 

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Unlike other time management apps this one doesn’t give you a prescribed break, which means you get to choose how much time you take off and just plant another seed when you’re ready to get back to work. Some people may prefer the structure of a timed break, but I enjoyed being flexible with my time off.

This app was very easy to download and use, and I didn’t find any glitches with it. As I downloaded the free version on my Nexus tablet, there are adverts that appear each time you grow a tree. I found this a bit distracting, but it means that the app comes at no cost to the user.

Overall, I would say this app could be a useful tool for those of us who struggle to concentrate sometimes. I especially liked that the number of study sessions you do are related to the size of forest you grow, which motivated me to stay focused and accumulate trees.

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If you are an SGUL student interested in getting more information and advice about time management, visit the Study+ time and task management page on Moodle (SGUL log in required)

All posts on this blog are subject to the our mobile resources disclaimer, please take the time to read it carefully.

Quick Look: Medscape App

Name:  Medscape App

Publisher: WebMD

Devices: iOS 9.0 or later. Android 4.0.3 and up.   Sive 28.7MB

Available from: Apple’s App Store  and Google Play

Price: Free

Type of information:
This app is designed to support clinicians with all of their professional needs, including decision-making support at the point-of-care, medical news and perspectives from thought leaders across medicine.

For: doctors, medical students, nurses and other healthcare professionals for clinical information.

• Main pros – Authored and reviewed by a team of 7,700 doctors and pharmacists from leading medical centres to ensure that all content is current, evidence-based, and written in a format designed to support physicians in practice.
• Main cons – Some information will be more applicable to American users than British users, so use with caution.

The Medscape app can be used to look up the most current drug prescribing and safety information.  It allows access to 129 medical calculators covering formulas, scales and classifications, and provides reviews of the latest information about 4400 diseases and conditions.  It also provides detailed written and video instructions for over 1000 clinical procedures.
The app allows you to search the Medline database for journal articles, and provides updates for the latest news impacting your speciality.
In addition, the app offers accredited Continuing Medical Education courses for professional development.

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All posts on this blog are subject to the St George’s Library Disclaimer, please take the time to read it carefully.

Updated: Sept 2017

Quick Look: The Genetics Counselling App (TGCA)

 

 

Name:  The Genetics Counselling App (TGCA)

Publisher: St George’s, University of London

Devices: iPad with iOS version 6.1 or later.

Other Requirements:  36.6mb memory.

Available from: Apple’s App Store

Price: £2.99

Type of information:
The app gives a visual explanation of chromosomes from the body to gene level. The app highlights the most common types of Mendelian inheritance through a number of animations which the user controls depending on the scenario they are trying to emulate.

For: Health professionals and medical students.

• Main pros – Primarily for Genetic Counsellors/Practitioners, Geneticists, General Practitioners, related healthcare professionals and GCSE to Postgraduate students.
• Main cons – Cost

The Genetic Counselling App can be used during patient consultation to explain various complex genetics concepts and provide additional information as a teaching tool. The app is also a great revision tool for students.

The app explains some common genetics tests carried out in modern age. Finally the Genetics Counselling App links out to useful additional information which means the user can also easily access a wide range of up to date genetic websites when they come across less common genetic conditions.

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The app provides a good and modern way to teach and revise genetic basics and also the less common genetics conditions.

All posts on this blog are subject to the St George’s Library Disclaimer, please take the time to read it carefully.

Updated: 15th Sept 2017

Quick Look: Prognosis: Your Diagnosis

Name: Prognosis: Your Diagnosis

Publisher: Medical Joyworks

Devices: Android 4.1 and up. Tablets and iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad

Other requirements: The app takes 2.8mb to install, but as you download more cases, it will use up more memory.

Tested on:  Nexus 7

Available from: Apple’s iStore and the Google Play

Price: Free.

Type of information: Clinical case simulation game for physicians, medical students, nurses, and paramedics.

For: Physicians, medical students, nurses, and paramedics.

• Main pros – Free. New cases available regularly. Easy to use interface
• Main cons – Simplistic binary choices for clinical case management.

This clinical case simulation games is very simple to use and quick to download. Once you’ve installed the main app, you are given a list of cases that you download individually. Pick the ones you want to download, and once they are stored on your phone, you wont need 3g or WiFi to access the cases. You can browse all medical cases, or pick from four different categories: medicine, surgery, gyn & obs, and pediatrics. For each case, you go through 3 steps.

1. History: gives you information about the patient.
2. Investigate: you are given a selection of diagnostic tests that you can choose to perform, for the example below, this included TSH + FT$ and MRI Thorax.
3. Management: you are given four patient management choices to pick from. You can choose more than one option.

After this you are given a score depending on the choices that you have made.

Medical Joyworks have releases other versions of the app for particular specialties, such as cardiology and neurology.

 

For more information: read the iMedicalApps review or go to the official app website.