Case Title, System, and Privacy

When creating a new case, you will be asked to do three things: 

1. Give it a title
2. Give it a system
3. Acknowledge our terms of use

Give it a case title

Each case should have a case title which can be entered in its dedicated box - a clear and concise case title is vital to having the educational case library well organized and easy to navigate. The title should be a concise diagnosis of the case.

Format

The case title is the diagnosis of the case:

• Hepatoma

NOT

• Interesting case of a patient with hepatoma
• Pathologically-proven hepatoma (this should be included in the case description)

No period should be placed at the end of the case title, e.g. "Hepatoma" not "Hepatoma."

Capitalization

Titles should be in sentence case:

• Myeloma with extraskeletal involvement

NOT

• myeloma with extraskeletal involvement
• MYELOMA WITH EXTRASKELETAL INVOLVEMENT
• Myeloma With Extra Skeletal Involvement

Full names, not abbreviations

Use the full name of the condition rather than abbreviations. 

• Intervertebral disc disease

NOT

• IVDD
• Intervertebral disc disease (IVDD)

The exception to this is if

• the abbreviation is better known than the full name in which case it can be included or even used solely if the term is very long. 

Highlighting a specific point

Under occasional circumstances, a specific point may need to be highlighted in addition to the diagnosis. Please format using a hyphen 

• Myeloma - occult

NOT

• Myeloma: occult
• Myeloma (occult)

Specify special technique

Each series in a case already has a modality and as such adding this routinely is not required. There are, however, occasions where the case includes something specific and not routine that may be of use. These should be added in brackets. Examples include: 

• Liver adenoma (CEUS)

Specify illustration, diagram, photo or pathology

Similarly, occasionally you may want to specify that a case only consists of an illustration or a photo. Modalities rarely need to be included in the case title as they are displayed in the search results. This can be done with brackets. Note, even if multiple, the singular should be used. 

• Sailboat (photo)
• Fracture classification (diagram)
• Base of skull (illustration) 
• Myeloma (pathology)
• Astrocytoma (gross pathology)
• Glioblastoma (histology)

Give it a system

Systems are one way we organize case on Vetlucent - each case can have a single system or can have multiple systems. There is no limit to how many systems are included. At least one system must be selected for a case.

Patient confidentiality

It is crucial that patient confidentiality is maintained. Under no circumstances must information be uploaded either in the patient's presenting symptoms, case description or images themselves that could identify an individual patient. 

Nothing in your images or description could lead to the identification of an individual. The most easily overlooked is embedded data on your images, especially ultrasound. Your images should have no text on them whatsoever. 

What is considered an identifier

Identifiers are anything that could lead to the images being linked to a particular patient. Although veterinary patient identification is less stringent, we take our lead from the HIPAA guidelines 1:

• name
• initials
• date of birth
• address, including full or partial postal code
• telephone or fax numbers or contact information
• e-mail addresses
• unique identifying numbers, e.g. UR, MRN, HID
• medical device identifiers, e.g. serial numbers
• web or internet protocol addresses containing any link to the patient
• biometric data
• facial photograph or comparable image
• audiotapes
• date of study

If you upload images or text with identifiers

Cases with patient identifiers will be deleted without notice to authors.

These issues are covered in our terms of use. 

If you find identifying information

As Vetlucent is a collaborative project, we are unable to stop identifying information being uploaded, and we rely on contributors to abide by our terms of use. In the event that you find a case with personal information, we would be very appreciative of an email sent to privacy@vetlucent.com and we will remove the content immediately.