I know everyone is buried in COVID-19 news, updates, and theories. To me, that makes it difficult to cut through the opinions and see the evidence that should actually guide physicians, policymakers, and the public.

To me, the most important thing is the ability to find the answer to my research question easily and to know that this answer is reasonably complete and evidence-driven. That means getting organized access to the scientific literature. Many sources (including a National Library of Medicine database) present thousands of articles, but the organization is the piece that is missing.

That is why I launched StudyViz, a new product that enables physicians to build an updatable visualization of all studies related to a topic of interest. Then, my physician collaborators built just such a visual for COVID-19 research, presenting a sunburst diagram that users can select to identify their research question of interest.

For instance, if you are interested in the impact of COVID-19 on pregnant patients, just go to “Subpopulations” and find “Pregnancy” (or neonates, if that is your concern). We nested the tags so that you can “drill down” on your question, and so that related concepts are close to each other. Then, to view the studies themselves, just click on them to see an abstract with the key info (patients, interventions, and outcomes) highlighted:

This is based on a complex concept hierarchy built by our collaborators and that is constantly evolving as the literature does:

Even beyond that, we opened up our software to let any researchers who are interested build similar visuals on any disease state, as COVID-19 is not the only disease for which organizing and accessing the scientific literature is important!

We are seeking medical coinvestigators–any physician interested in working with us, simply email contact@nested-knowledge.com or contact us on our website!