# Workup Desk

> An AI workspace for doctors. Bring a patient's referral, results and notes into one place, ask questions and get answers from those sources and draft the assessment and letters you then edit.

Workup Desk is a patient workspace for doctors. It is documentation help and decision support. It is not an electronic health record, it does not integrate with one, and it does not record or transcribe visits.

## Key facts

- Category: an AI workspace for medical doctors to assess a patient. One workspace per patient.
- Audience: primary care physicians, specialists in outpatient clinics, and hospital doctors, in small practices, clinics and hospital departments.
- Sources in: PDF, Word (.docx), Excel (.xlsx) and PNG files, plus text notes. Typical sources are the referral, previous letters, laboratory and imaging results, ECG reports, medication lists and visit notes.
- Drafting: clinical assessments, referral letters, discharge and handover summaries and patient-friendly summaries, drafted from the workspace sources with settings for document type, purpose, audience, tone, length, instructions and templates. Drafts open in a rich-text editor with autosave.
- Questions: a chat panel answers questions from the patient's sources and names the source of each answer.
- Export: PDF and Word (.docx).
- Teams: organization accounts with owner, admin and member roles; you share each workspace or document with colleagues as viewer or editor.
- Sign-in: email magic link or password; single sign-on (SAML) for organizations.
- The doctor edits every draft, makes every clinical decision and stays responsible for the document. The product does not diagnose.
- Availability: early access by invitation; a paid plan. Join the waitlist at https://www.workupdesk.com/waitlist.
- Contact: hello@workupdesk.com.

The full text of the product, solution, presentation, use case, tool, template, glossary and guide pages is at https://www.workupdesk.com/llms-full.txt.

## What this site is authoritative about

How clinical documents are structured and what a workup gathers: the history in order, findings kept apart from interpretation, a ranked differential diagnosis, a plan with owners and safety-netting, referral letters and handovers, and the questions to ask before patient data goes into an AI tool.

## What this site does not claim

- No HIPAA compliance, signed BAA or DPA, GDPR certification, ISO 27001 or SOC 2, CE marking or FDA clearance. Organizations should add identifiable patient data only once the data processing agreement for their jurisdiction is in place.
- No EHR integrations, voice recording or transcription, diagnosis by AI, or clinical accuracy figures.
- No customer counts, time-saved figures or testimonials. The product is in early access.
- Nothing on this site is medical advice about an individual patient or legal advice. Patients named in examples are invented.

## Guides

- [Gather and document what a good patient workup needs](https://www.workupdesk.com/guides): Start here to see which sources to gather, how to order the history, and what the written assessment should contain. Hub for every guide below.

### Clinical documents

Learn what an assessment and a referral letter contain, and in what order.

- [How to write a clinical assessment](https://www.workupdesk.com/guides/how-to-write-a-clinical-assessment): Learn the sections of a clinical assessment, what goes in each, and the mistakes that make a reader repeat the workup.
- [Writing a referral letter](https://www.workupdesk.com/guides/writing-a-referral-letter): Give the receiving doctor what they need to triage your referral letter and act on it without calling you.

### Clinical reasoning

Get from the history and findings to a ranked list of possibilities.

- [Building a differential diagnosis](https://www.workupdesk.com/guides/building-a-differential-diagnosis): Build a ranked differential from the history and findings, and write the reasoning down.

### AI tools and patient data

See what general AI tools do well for doctors, and what to check before patient data goes in.

- [NotebookLM for doctors: what Gemini Notebook does well](https://www.workupdesk.com/guides/notebooklm-for-doctors): See where Gemini Notebook helps with literature, guidelines and teaching, and what to check before a patient's records go in.
- [AI tools and patient data: what to check first](https://www.workupdesk.com/guides/ai-and-patient-data): Check de-identification, agreements, storage, access and audit trails, and put the same questions to any vendor.

## Comparisons

Comparisons against named alternatives. Factual claims about other products carry a public source and a verification date on the page itself.

- [All comparisons](https://www.workupdesk.com/compare): Index of comparison pages.
- [Workup Desk vs Gemini Notebook](https://www.workupdesk.com/compare/gemini-notebook): Google's source-grounded notebook, renamed from NotebookLM in July 2026. It is free to start, polished and broad, and Google aims its outputs at research and study.
- [Workup Desk vs ChatGPT](https://www.workupdesk.com/compare/chatgpt): The general assistant many doctors already open. OpenAI offers ChatGPT for Clinicians free to verified US clinicians and ChatGPT for Healthcare to organizations.
- [Workup Desk vs OpenEvidence](https://www.workupdesk.com/compare/openevidence): Evidence search for clinicians, free for verified US healthcare professionals and paid for by labeled advertising. Its Visits feature adds ambient notes and patient documents.
- [Workup Desk vs ambient AI scribes](https://www.workupdesk.com/compare/ambient-scribes): Scribes record the encounter and draft the visit note, often inside the EHR. They start from the conversation, where a patient workspace starts from the documents.
- [Workup Desk vs EHR notes and Word documents](https://www.workupdesk.com/compare/ehr-notes): The real competitor. Free, familiar and already open, until the referral runs long and the results sit in several places.

## Product

- [Home](https://www.workupdesk.com): An AI workspace for doctors. Bring a patient's referral, results and notes into one place, ask questions and get answers from those sources and draft the assessment and letters you then edit.
- [Patient workspace](https://www.workupdesk.com/product/patient-workspace): Keep one patient's referral, letters, results and your own notes in one workspace. Upload PDF, Word, Excel and image files and add notes as text.
- [Assessment drafting](https://www.workupdesk.com/product/assessment): Draft the history, findings, assessment, differential diagnosis and plan from the patient's own sources, then review and edit it in a rich-text editor.
- [Ask the record](https://www.workupdesk.com/product/ask): Ask questions in a chat panel and get answers from the patient's own sources, each with the name of its source document.
- [Letters and summaries](https://www.workupdesk.com/product/letters): Draft a referral letter, a discharge or handover summary or a summary the patient can read from the same workspace, then edit and export it.
- [Team and sharing](https://www.workupdesk.com/product/team): Run one account for your practice or department with owner, admin and member roles, and share each patient's workspace as viewer or editor.
- [Export and hand off](https://www.workupdesk.com/product/export): Export a finished assessment, referral or summary as PDF or Word, then file it in the patient record or send it through your usual channel.

## Solutions

- [For primary care physicians](https://www.workupdesk.com/for/general-practitioners): Bring a patient's letters, results and your notes into one workspace, ask questions of them and draft the assessment or referral you then edit.
- [For specialists](https://www.workupdesk.com/for/specialists): Read a thick referral pack once. Ask questions of the letters and results in one workspace and draft the clinic assessment and the reply to the referrer.
- [For hospital doctors](https://www.workupdesk.com/for/hospital-doctors): Gather an admission's letters, results and notes in one workspace, ask questions on rounds and draft the handover or discharge summary.
- [For small practices](https://www.workupdesk.com/solutions/small-practices): Give every doctor in a small practice one workspace per patient, with questions, drafting and PDF or Word export. You need no integration or setup project.
- [For clinics and hospitals](https://www.workupdesk.com/solutions/clinics-and-hospitals): Run one account per department with roles, SAML single sign-on and per-patient sharing, and draft every assessment and letter from a shared template.

## Use cases

- [Use cases](https://www.workupdesk.com/use-cases): Worked examples: the sources a doctor adds, what they ask for and what they check.
- [Read a patient's whole history in an emergency](https://www.workupdesk.com/use-cases/emergency-admission): An emergency doctor loads 15 years of records and asks for the allergies, blood thinners, airway history and wishes that shape the next hour.
- [Prepare for a new patient with a thick referral](https://www.workupdesk.com/use-cases/thick-referral): A cardiologist adds a referral and years of letters and results to one workspace, asks for the relevant history and results with dates, and checks each one before clinic.
- [Review new results against the history](https://www.workupdesk.com/use-cases/results-review): A family physician adds a batch of new lab results next to earlier ones and the visit note, asks what changed and what bears on the complaint, and checks units and dates.
- [Check a referral has what the specialist needs](https://www.workupdesk.com/use-cases/pre-referral-check): A family physician asks what a cardiology referral for palpitations needs that the sources do not yet contain, fills the gaps, then drafts the referral letter and edits it.
- [Follow up a patient seen by several clinics](https://www.workupdesk.com/use-cases/complex-follow-up): A geriatrician adds letters from several clinics and asks for active problems, recent medication changes and open plan items, each with its source, before the review.
- [Write a patient-friendly summary of the plan](https://www.workupdesk.com/use-cases/patient-summary): After a visit, a doctor drafts a plain-language summary from the assessment that tells the patient what the doctor found, what happens next and when to seek help.
- [Hand over a ward patient at the end of a shift](https://www.workupdesk.com/use-cases/ward-handover): A hospital doctor drafts an SBAR handover from the admission notes, progress notes and results, lists pending results and tasks, and shares the workspace with the next doctor.

## Presentations

- [Presentations](https://www.workupdesk.com/presentations): Gather and document what a good workup needs for common presentations.
- [Chest pain](https://www.workupdesk.com/presentations/chest-pain): In a chest pain workup, gather and document the character and timing of the pain, cardiovascular risk factors, ECG and troponin results with times, and the red flags you asked about.
- [Breathlessness](https://www.workupdesk.com/presentations/breathlessness): In a breathlessness workup, gather and document onset and tempo, exercise tolerance, cardiac and respiratory history, oxygen saturation, and the spirometry, imaging and lab results already on file.
- [Palpitations](https://www.workupdesk.com/presentations/palpitations): In a palpitations workup, gather and document how episodes start and stop, rate and rhythm, triggers, any ECG captured during symptoms, thyroid and electrolyte results, and the red flags.
- [Headache](https://www.workupdesk.com/presentations/headache): In a headache workup, gather and document onset and pattern, associated features, analgesic use, blood pressure and a neurological examination, and the red flags for a secondary cause.
- [Dizziness](https://www.workupdesk.com/presentations/dizziness): In a dizziness workup, gather and document what the patient means by dizzy, episode timing and triggers, lying and standing blood pressure, a focused neurological and ear examination, and the red flags.
- [Falls in older adults](https://www.workupdesk.com/presentations/falls-in-older-adults): In a falls workup, gather and document the circumstances of each fall, loss of consciousness, injuries, the medication list, lying and standing blood pressure, gait, vision and cognition.
- [New confusion](https://www.workupdesk.com/presentations/new-confusion): In a workup for new confusion, gather and document onset and fluctuation, baseline cognition from a collateral history, recent medication changes, vital signs, and the possible precipitants.
- [Fatigue](https://www.workupdesk.com/presentations/fatigue): In a fatigue workup, gather and document duration and pattern, sleep and mood, weight change, functional impact, a focused examination, and the screening lab results already on file.
- [Unintentional weight loss](https://www.workupdesk.com/presentations/weight-loss): In a workup for unintentional weight loss, gather and document weights with dates, appetite and diet, a systems review, the screening results already on file, and the red flags.
- [Abdominal pain](https://www.workupdesk.com/presentations/abdominal-pain): In an abdominal pain workup, gather and document site, onset and character, bowel and urinary symptoms, gynecological history where relevant, examination findings, results, and the red flags.

## Free tools

- [Pack-year calculator](https://www.workupdesk.com/tools/pack-year-calculator): Calculate pack-years from packs or cigarettes per day and years smoked, across several smoking periods, with the formula and its limits explained.
- [BMI calculator](https://www.workupdesk.com/tools/bmi-calculator): Calculate BMI in pounds, feet and inches or kilograms and centimeters, and see the WHO adult category, with the formula and its limits explained.
- [QTc calculator](https://www.workupdesk.com/tools/qtc-calculator): Calculate the corrected QT interval by the Bazett and Fridericia formulas from QT in milliseconds and heart rate or RR interval, with both shown.
- [CKD-EPI 2021 eGFR calculator](https://www.workupdesk.com/tools/egfr-calculator): Estimate GFR from serum creatinine, age and sex with the race-free CKD-EPI 2021 equation, in mg/dL or µmol/L, and see the KDIGO G category.

## Templates

- [Write a clinical assessment in a fixed structure](https://www.workupdesk.com/templates/clinical-assessment-template): Download a free clinical assessment template with sections for the reason for assessment, sources reviewed, history in order, findings, a ranked differential and a plan with owners and safety-netting. Text file: https://www.workupdesk.com/downloads/clinical-assessment-template.txt
- [Write a referral letter the receiver can triage](https://www.workupdesk.com/templates/referral-letter-template): Download a free referral letter template that puts the question first, then urgency, relevant history, results with dates, what you have done, what the patient knows and the safety-netting advice. Text file: https://www.workupdesk.com/downloads/referral-letter-template.txt
- [Hand over a patient in SBAR](https://www.workupdesk.com/templates/sbar-handover-template): Download a free SBAR handover template with situation, background, assessment and recommendation, plus pending results, outstanding tasks with owners and an escalation plan. Text file: https://www.workupdesk.com/downloads/sbar-handover-template.txt

## Glossary

- [Clinical documentation glossary](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary): Definitions of the clinical documentation and AI terms doctors meet.
- [Presenting complaint](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/presenting-complaint): The presenting complaint is the main problem that brought the patient in, recorded in a short phrase and ideally in the patient's own words.
- [History of presenting complaint](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/history-of-presenting-complaint): The history of presenting complaint is the detailed story of the main problem: onset, character, timing, triggers, relieving factors and associated symptoms.
- [Review of systems](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/review-of-systems): A review of systems is a structured set of questions about each body system, asked to find symptoms the patient did not mention.
- [SOAP note](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/soap-note): A SOAP note structures a clinical entry as Subjective, Objective, Assessment and Plan, separating what the patient reports from what you found and concluded.
- [Differential diagnosis](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/differential-diagnosis): A differential diagnosis is a ranked list of the conditions that could explain a patient's problem, with the reasoning for each position.
- [Working diagnosis](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/working-diagnosis): A working diagnosis is the explanation you act on until new information confirms or replaces it, usually the top of your differential.
- [Red flags](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/red-flags): Red flags are history or examination features that raise the likelihood of a serious cause and call for prompt action or further assessment.
- [Safety-netting](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/safety-netting): Safety-netting is the advice you give a patient about which symptoms should bring them back, how urgently and to whom, recorded in the notes.
- [Problem list](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/problem-list): A problem list is a running list of a patient's active and past diagnoses and issues, kept current so any clinician sees the whole picture at a glance.
- [Medication reconciliation](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/medication-reconciliation): Medication reconciliation compares every list of a patient's medicines to produce one accurate list of what they actually take, with doses.
- [Workup](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/workup): A workup is the process of assessing a patient's problem: gathering sources, taking the history, examining, investigating and writing the assessment.
- [SBAR](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/sbar): SBAR is a structure for clinical communication: Situation, Background, Assessment and Recommendation. It is widely used for handovers and escalation.
- [Handover](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/handover): A handover transfers responsibility for a patient from one clinician or team to another, with the information they need to continue care.
- [Discharge summary](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/discharge-summary): A discharge summary tells the patient's primary care physician what happened in the hospital: diagnoses, treatment, medication changes and what needs follow-up.
- [Referral letter](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/referral-letter): A referral letter asks another clinician a specific question about a patient and gives them the history and results they need to answer it.
- [Clinical reasoning](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/clinical-reasoning): Clinical reasoning is how a clinician gathers information, weighs it and reaches a diagnosis and plan, including the checks against common errors.
- [Pre-test probability](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/pre-test-probability): Pre-test probability is how likely a condition is before a test, based on age, sex, risk factors and symptoms. It decides how much a result should move you.
- [Source document](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/source-document): A source document is the original record a fact comes from, such as a lab report, an ECG report or a letter. Checking it is how you verify a statement.
- [Grounding](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/grounding): Grounding means an AI tool answers from a given set of sources rather than from general training data, and can point to the passage it used.
- [Hallucination](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/hallucination): A hallucination is a statement an AI tool produces that sounds plausible but is not supported by its sources or by fact, such as an invented result.
- [De-identification](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/de-identification): De-identification removes or alters details that identify a patient, such as name, date of birth and record numbers. It lowers risk but rarely removes it.
- [Data processing agreement](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/data-processing-agreement): A data processing agreement is the contract under which a vendor processes personal data for your organization. In US healthcare the equivalent is a BAA.
- [Audit trail](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/audit-trail): An audit trail records who viewed, added, changed, shared or exported a record and when, so access can be reviewed and incidents investigated.
- [Structured note](https://www.workupdesk.com/glossary/structured-note): A structured note follows fixed headings, such as history, findings, assessment and plan, so omissions stand out and readers find information fast.

## Policies

- [Pricing](https://www.workupdesk.com/pricing): What the product costs and what each plan includes.
- [Security](https://www.workupdesk.com/security): The controls we apply today.
- [Press kit](https://www.workupdesk.com/press): Logos, screenshots and approved descriptions.
- [Privacy](https://www.workupdesk.com/privacy): How we handle data.
- [Terms](https://www.workupdesk.com/terms): Terms of service.