List of open-source health software

The following is a list of notable software packages and applications licensed under an open-source license or in the public domain for use in the health care industry.

Public health and biosurveillance

• Epi Info is public domain statistical software for epidemiology developed by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.^[1]
• Spatiotemporal Epidemiological Modeler is a tool, originally developed at IBM Research, for modelings and visualizing the spread of infectious diseases. It is maintained by the Eclipse Foundation and available under terms of the Eclipse Public License.^[2][3]

Electronic records and medical practice management

Name	Maintainer	License	Programming language/ Software stack	Operating System	Features				Target setting
					EHR/EMR	HIS?	Practice management?	Other
ClearHealth	ClearHealth Inc.[4]	GNU GPL[4]	PHP, JavaScript[5]	?	EMR	?	Scheduling & billing	HIPAA security
ERPNext	Frappe Technologies	GNU GPL[6]	Python; JavaScript	?	EMR	Yes	Yes
GaiaEHR	?	GNU GPL[7]	PHP & Ext JS	?	EHR	?	?
GNUmed	GNUmed	GNU GPL[8]	Python (wxPython); PostgreSQL[8]	Cross-platform[8]	Yes[8]	No	?
GNU Health	GNU Health (GNU Project)	GNU GPL[9]	Python; PostgreSQL	Cross-platform	EMR[9]	Yes[9]	Yes[9]
Hospital OS	?	GNU GPL[10]	Java[10]	Linux & Windows[10]	?	Yes	?		Small Thai hospitals[10]
HOSxP	?	Public domain[11]	Delphi/Kylix[11]	Windows[11]	EHR	Yes[11]	Financial[11]		Thai hospitals[11]
MedinTux	MedinTux team[12]	CeCILL[12]	C++[13]	Cross-platform[14]	?	?	Yes	Modular design; web[15] & desktop interfaces	French hospital emergency departments & smaller practices
OpenEMR	?	GNU GPL[16]	PHP, JavaScript; MySQL[17]	Cross-platform[16]	Yes[16]	?	Yes[16]	Patient portal & prescriptions[16]
Open Dental	Open Dental Software[18]	GNU GPL[18]	?	?	Dental record	No	Yes		Dentistry
OpenHospital	Informatici Senza Frontiere[19]	GNU GPL[19]	Java[19]	Cross-platform[19]	EMR	Yes	Yes		Small rural hospitals
OpenMRS	OpenMRS Inc.[20]	MPL with Healthcare Disclaimer[20]	Java, JavaScript	Cross-platform	EMR	?	?	Extensible & scalable	Clinic, Hospital System, Country Level Health System
OSCAR McMaster	?	GNU GPL[21]	Java	?	EMR[21]	?	Billing	Web interface; PHR[21]	Canadian healthcare providers
Spinnaker	Dental IT Ltd[22]	GNU GPL[22]	?	?	Dental record	?	Yes	Open Dental fork[23]	UK dental practices[23]
THIRRA	?	MPL[24]	PHP5 (CodeIgniter), JavaScript (jQuery);[24] PostgreSQL	?	EHR[24]	?	?	Disease surveillance;[24] web interface	Ambulatory care & public health[24]
VistA	US Department of Veterans Affairs	Free[25]	MUMPS	?	EHR	?	?		Veterans Health Administration facilities
ZEPRS Zcore	Research Triangle Institute[26]	Apache[26]	Java[26]	?	Yes	?	?	Web interface

Health system management

• iHRIS is an integrated Human Resource Information System developed by IntraHealth International under USAID-funded CapacityPlus project and deployed in more than 20 countries in the world.^[27] iHRIS is distributed under the GNU GPL.^[28]
• DHIS is a district health management information system and data warehouse. DHIS2 is released under the BSD license.^[29]
• HRHIS is a human resource for health information system for management of human resources for health developed by University of Dar es Salaam college of information and communication technology, Department of Computer Science and Engineering, for Ministry of Health and Social Welfare (Tanzania) and funded by the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA).^{[citation needed]}

Disease management

• Breathing Games is a series of research-backed, co-created games to prevent, diagnose and treat chronic respiratory diseases. They are released under the Peer Production licence.^[30]
• Nightscout is a collection of software tools, including mobile clients, to enable DIY cloud-based continuous glucose monitoring "…for informational and educational purposes."^[31] Individual components are available under various open-source licenses, including the GNU GPL,^[32] GNU AGPL,^[33] MIT License,^[34] and BSD licenses.^[35]

• Tidepool makes open-source tools to help people better manage diabetes. They have received FDA clearance for their Loop insulin dosing app.^[36][37]

Imaging/visualization

• CamBA is a collection of neuroimaging pipelines distributed under the GNU GPL.^[38]
• Drishti is a volumetric visualization package for viewing computer tomography data. Able to import DICOM image stacks. It is available under the MIT license.^[39]
• Endrov Image and data viewer and editor. It is available under the BSD license.^[40]
• GIMIAS is a workflow-oriented environment focused on biomedical image computing and simulation. It is available under a BSD-style license.^[41]
• Ginkgo CADx Cross-platform open source DICOM viewer and dicomizer. It is available under the GNU LGPL.^[42]
• Insight Segmentation and Registration Toolkit (ITK) v4.0+ is released under the Apache license.^[43]
• InVesalius 3D medical imaging reconstruction software. It is available under the GNU GPL.^[44]
• ITK-SNAP Interactive software for 3D image navigation, annotation, and automatic segmentation. It is available under the GNU GPL.^[45][46]
• Orthanc – Lightweight, RESTful DICOM server for medical imaging. It is available under the GNU GPLv3.^[47]
• ParaView large-scale visualization tool. It is available under the BSD license.^[48]
• 3DSlicer Platform for medical image visualization and algorithm development. DICOM support, segmentation and registration, Diffusion MRI processing, and image guided surgery support. It is available under a BSD-style license.^[49]
• Voreen volume rendering engine—a library for visually exploring volume data sets. DICOM is supported and Voreen is used in medical visualization as well as for visualizing electron microscopy data. It is available under the GNU GPL.^[50]
• VTK is a visualization toolkit available under the BSD license.^[51]
• Studierfenster (StudierFenster) is a free, non-commercial Open Science client/server-based Medical Imaging Processing (MIP) online framework.^[52]
• Medical open network for AI is a framework for Deep learning in healthcare imaging that is open-source available under the Apache Licence and supported by the community.^[53]

Medical information systems

• Caisis is a web-based information system for the storage and analysis of cancer patient data intended to bridge the gap between clinic and research. It is available under the GNU GPL.^[54]
• cTAKES ("clinical Text Analysis Knowledge Extraction Software") is a natural language processing system for extracting information from electronic medical record clinical free-text, an Apache top level project (TLP) since 2013, developed by the Mayo Clinic and others. It is available under the Apache license.^[55]

Research

• Galaxy is a web platform for data-intensive biology using geographically-distributed supercomputers.^[56]
• LabKey Server is an extensible platform for integrating, analyzing and sharing all types of biomedical research data. It provides secure, web-based access to research data and includes a customizable data processing pipeline. It is distributed under the Apache license.^[57]

Mobile devices[58]

• OpenAPS is a set of development tools and documentation to support a DIY implementation of an artificial pancreas for people with Type 1 Diabetes. Common setups include the interfacing of CGMs, Insulin Pumps, and Raspberry Pi devices. It is released under the MIT license, but compatible medical devices are proprietary.^[59]
• Ushahidi allows people to submit crisis information through text messaging using a mobile phone, email or web form. Displays information in map view. It is released under the GNU Affero General Public License, but some libraries use different licenses.^[60]

Out-of-the-box distributions

• BioLinux
• Debian-Med is a Debian Pure Blend for use in medical and biomedical settings.^[61]
• Ubuntu-Med

Interoperability[62]

• Mirth is an open source cross-platform HL7 interface engine that enables bi-directional sending of HL7 messages between systems and applications over multiple transports. It is available under the Mozilla Public License.^[63]

Specifications

• Continuity of Care Document
• Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources (FHIR) is a Health Level 7 interoperability specification that defines JSON and XML data formats and a RESTful API.^[64][65] It is available under the CC0 license.^[66]
• openEHR is an open standard specification in health informatics that describes the management and storage, retrieval and exchange of health data in electronic health records (EHRs) following a two-level modeling paradigm. The OpenEHR base specification is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported license.^[67]

See also

• Free and open-source software portal

• Electronic medical record
• eHealth
• Gello Expression Language
• Health informatics
• Hospital information systems
• List of freeware health software
• List of biomedical cybernetics software
• List of open-source bioinformatics software
• List of open-source health hardware
• mHealth

References

1. "Epi Info". CDC. 13 September 2016.
2. "Download STEM". Eclipse. 22 June 2017.
3. "Eclipse Foundation Software User Agreement". Eclipse. 9 April 2014.
4. "clearhealth/LICENSE". GitHub. 30 January 2013.
5. "clearhealth/clearhealth". GitHub. Retrieved 30 June 2017.
6. "ERPNext Healthcare/LICENSE". GitHub. 29 January 2016.
7. "gaiaehr/LICENSE". GitHub. 29 January 2016.
8. "Gnumed FAQs". Gnumed. 10 October 2011.
9. "GNU Health - Summary". Savannah. Retrieved 29 June 2017.
10. "Hospital OS". SourceForge. 10 April 2013.
11. "HOSxP". SourceForge. 17 April 2013.
12. "À propos" [About]. Medintux (in French). Retrieved 30 June 2017.
13. "dev". Medintux (in French). 29 June 2012.
14. "Installation". Medintux (in French). Retrieved 10 July 2017.
15. "MedWebTux". Medintux (in French). 13 July 2013.
16. "OpenEMR Features". OpenEMR. 6 May 2017.
17. "Development Policies". OpenEMR Project Wiki. 17 April 2017.
18. "Open Source License". Open Dental. Retrieved 29 June 2017.
19. "Open Hospital". SourceForge. 4 June 2017.
20. "OpenMRS License Information". OpenMRS. Retrieved 29 June 2017.
21. "Welcome". OSCAR User's Manual. Retrieved 29 June 2017.
22. "Welcome to Spinnaker". Spinnaker. Dental IT Ltd. Retrieved 30 June 2017.
23. "Spinnaker". Dental IT Ltd. Retrieved 30 June 2017.
24. "THIRRA Electronic Health Records Systems". SourceForge. 31 January 2017.
25. "Distributions of VistA". WorldVistA. Retrieved 1 November 2021.
26. "Licensing". ICTedge. Archived from the original on 10 September 2014.
27. "About iHRIS". iHRIS. Retrieved 3 July 2017.
28. "Frequently Asked Questions". iHRIS. Retrieved 30 June 2017.
29. "DHIS 2 Overview". DHIS2. Retrieved 30 June 2017.
30. "Get Involved". Breathing Games. 17 December 2016.
31. "The Nightscout Project". Retrieved 3 July 2017.
32. "android-uploader/LICENSE". GitHub. 27 September 2014.
    "lasso/LICENSE". GitHub. 2 July 2015.
    "chrome-uploader/LICENSE.md". GitHub. 24 November 2014.
    "windows-phone-app/LICENSE". GitHub. 29 November 2014.
33. "cgm-remote-monitor/LICENSE". GitHub. 25 September 2014.
    "process-controls/LICENSE". GitHub. 11 January 2015.
34. "nightscout-apple-watch/LICENSE". GitHub. 23 June 2015.
35. "fda-presubmission/LICENSE". GitHub. 24 June 2014.
    "cgm-pebble/LICENSE". GitHub. 22 February 2014.
36. "tidepool-org/Loop: An automated insulin delivery app template for iOS, built on LoopKit". GitHub. 8 December 2023.
37. "Tidepool Loop has received FDA Clearance!". Tidepool. 4 January 2023.
38. "CamBA: Tool/Resource Info". NITRC. Neuroimaging Informatics Tools and Resources Clearinghouse. Retrieved 3 July 2017.
39. "drishti/license.md". GitHub. 1 February 2016.
40. "Endrov". SourceForge. 3 January 2016.
41. "License". GIMIAS. Retrieved 30 June 2017.
42. "Ginkgo CADx". Retrieved 30 June 2017.
43. "Copyright and License". ITK. Kitware.
44. "invesalius3/LICENSE.txt". GitHub. 10 June 2009.
45. "ITK-SNAP". NITRC. Neuroimaging Informatics Tools and Resources Clearinghouse. Retrieved 30 June 2017.
46. "License". MITK. 1 December 2014.
47. "Download". Orthanc. Retrieved 30 June 2017.
48. "ParaView License". ParaView. Retrieved 30 June 2017.
49. "License". SlicerWiki. 24 November 2016.
50. "About Voreen". Voreen. Retrieved 30 June 2017.
51. "License". VTK. Retrieved 30 June 2017.
52. "License". StudierFenster. Retrieved 5 October 2020.
53. Cardoso, M. Jorge; Li, Wenqi; Brown, Richard (2022-10-04). "MONAI: An open-source framework for deep learning in healthcare". pp. 1–25. arXiv:2211.02701 [cs.LG].
54. "Frequently Asked Questions". Caisis. BioDigital. Retrieved 30 June 2017.
55. "History". cTAKES. Apache Software Foundation. Retrieved 30 June 2017.
56. "Copyrights and Licenses". Galaxy Wiki. 14 May 2015.
57. "FAQ - Frequently Asked Questions". LabKey Support. Retrieved 30 June 2017.
58. "glucosio-android/LICENSE". GitHub. 19 August 2015.
    "glucosio-ios/LICENSE". GitHub. 19 August 2015.
59. "LICENSE.txt". GitHub. 26 August 2017.
60. "platform/LICENSE.md". GitHub. 18 November 2014.
61. "Debian Med". Debian. Software in the Public Interest, Inc. 5 July 2016.
62. "LAIKA: EHR Testing Framework". SourceForge. 19 April 2013.
63. Brauer, Jacob (14 August 2013). "Source Code Contribution Guidelines". Mirth Connect.
64. "FHIR Foundation". Retrieved 3 July 2017.
65. "Foundation Module". FHIR. HL7. 19 April 2017.
66. "License and Legal Terms". FHIR. HL7. 19 April 2017.
67. "specifications-BASE/LICENSE". GitHub. 29 July 2015.

Further reading

• "Medical Free/Libre and Open Source Software". IMIA Open Source Working Group. Retrieved 3 July 2017.
• Millard, Peter S.; Bru, Juan; Berger, Christopher A. (4 July 2012). "Open-source point-of-care electronic medical records for use in resource-limited settings: systematic review and questionnaire surveys". BMJ Open. 2 (4): e000690. doi:10.1136/bmjopen-2011-000690. PMC 3391372. PMID 22763661.