README.txt

   1                         DDStorm
   2                        =========
   3
   4 What is DDStorm?
   5 ================
   6
   7 DDStorm is a python application for brainstorming medical differential
   8 diagnosis. It is designed to be modular and easily configurable. It is
   9 meant to be used by the medical professionals.
  10
  11 DDStorm is still in development phase and not ready for deployment.
  12
  13 Usage
  14 =====
  15
  16 Clone the repository to your computer. Alternatively download the
  17 source code zip and extract it.
  18
  19 Run the bash script named 'start' to start the program. Alternatively
  20 run 'python3 __main__.py' within the program directory.
  21
  22 The program has a graphical user interface that can be easily
  23 used.
  24
  25 Add symptoms: type the symptom name in the top text entry box and
  26 click on the <Add> button. Alternatively you can click on the
  27 <Browse_Symptoms> button to browse through a list of available
  28 symptoms and select from there.
  29
  30 The symptoms you add will appear in the left sided panel. Depending on
  31 the symptoms you add the list of differential diagnosis will update
  32 automatically in the right sided panel.
  33
  34 Configuration
  35 =============
  36
  37 You can change the program configuration by editing the 'ddstorm.conf'
  38 file in the program directory. Available options are-
  39
  40 library_path   - The directory where default library data is located
  41 custom_path    - The directory where user created library data is
  42                  located
  43 index_path     - The directory where the index of disease hierarchy is
  44                  located
  45 module_path    - The directory where compiled module files will be
  46                  saved.
  47 alias_path     - The directory where symptom aliases are located
  48 splash_screen  - Setting this to 'yes' (without quote) will show a
  49                  splash screen while starting up the program
  50 status_message - Setting this to 'on' (without quote) will show status
  51                  messages in the program main window
  52 clean_log      - Setting this to 'yes' (without quote) will delete
  53                  previous logs every time the program starts.
  54
  55 Editing DDStorm data
  56 ====================
  57
  58 DDStorm is designed to be extremely customizable. All data files are
  59 in plain text format and can be easily edited to suit the need of the
  60 user.
  61
  62 There are three types of files-
  63
  64 Library files - Contains the actual differential diagnosis data
  65 Index files   - Contains the hierarchy of diseases
  66 Alias files   - Contains disease alias
  67
  68 Library files
  69 -------------
  70
  71 * Naming conventions:
  72
  73 Library files are named after the "symptom". Names should be as
  74 concise as possible. But care should be taken to avoid confusion.
  75
  76 Library files are compiled flatly and the directory hierarchy is not
  77 preserved. So the files 'abdominal_pain/generalized.txt' and
  78 abdominal_pain/localized.txt' will result in symptoms named
  79 'generalized' and 'localized'. To avoid such confusion the naming
  80 should be 'abdominal pain, generalized.txt' and
  81 'abdominal pain, localized.txt'. The resulting symptoms would be
  82 easily searchable in the symptom list. E.g. if you enter
  83 'abdominal pain' in the browse box, it would show 'abdominal pain,
  84 generalized' and 'abdominal pain, localized' as available symptoms.
  85
  86 The library files support setting custom priority. The priority can be
  87 set by naming the file as <symptom.priority_number.txt>. For example
  88 in files named 'abdominal pain.50.txt' and 'abdominal pain.120.txt'
  89 the diagnosis mentioned in the second file will come first (120 has
  90 higher priority than 50). If no priority number is mentioned default
  91 priority '100' is used.
  92
  93 The file names may contain space, '-' or '_'. DDStorm converts '-' and
  94 '_' to spaces during execution.
  95
  96 * Data structure:
  97
  98 Library files contain a single diagnosis per line. The diagnosis
  99 should be as specific as possible. Preferably there should be a
 100 corresponding entry in the index files indicating the hierarchy of the
 101 condition.
 102
 103 Index files
 104 -----------
 105
 106 The index files represent the hierarchy of disease conditions. For
 107 example 'acute peritonitis' is a sub-type of 'peritonitis'. Now if
 108 symptom 'A' has a differential diagnosis of 'peritonitis' and symptom
 109 'B' has a differential diagnosis of 'acute peritonitis', their
 110 combined differential diagnosis will be the more general one
 111 i.e. 'peritonitis'.
 112
 113 The index files can be named anything. But for clarity it should be
 114 named according to the disease group it represents. For example an
 115 index files of abdominal conditions can be named 'abdomen.txt'.
 116
 117 * Data structure
 118
 119 Index files contain one disease condition per line. The sub-type of a
 120 disease must be written below it and indented by 'spaces' (not
 121 tabs).
 122
 123 For example:
 124
 125 peritonitis
 126     acute peritonitis
 127
 128 The disease conditions of the same level should have same number of
 129 spaces for indentation.
 130
 131 Alias files
 132 -----------
 133
 134 The alias files contain the alias of the disease conditions. It's
 135 useful when a same disease may be known by multiple names.
 136
 137 * Data structure
 138
 139 The alias files should have one disease condition per line. The
 140 aliases must be separated with ';'.
 141
 142 Modular structure
 143 -----------------
 144
 145 As the library files are processed flatly, without considering the
 146 directory structures, they can be freely organized in directories as
 147 needed.
 148
 149 The same conditions in different medical discipline can be
 150 kept in separate directories.
 151
 152 For example differential diagnosis abdominal pain in medicine and
 153 surgery can be organized in 'medical/abdominal pain.txt' and
 154 'surgery/abdominal pain.txt' respectively. The program will merge them
 155 together during execution.
 156
 157 Licensing
 158 =========
 159
 160 Copyright (c) 2015 Agnibho Mondal
 161 All rights reserved
 162
 163 This file is part of DDStorm.
 164
 165 DDStorm is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
 166 it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
 167 the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
 168 (at your option) any later version.
 169
 170 DDStorm is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
 171 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
 172 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the
 173 GNU General Public License for more details.
 174
 175 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
 176 along with DDStorm.  If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
 177
 178 Contacts
 179 ========
 180
 181 Agnibho Mondal
 182 mail@agnibho.com
 183 www.agnibho.com