Comparison

Prognosis vs PathoPlay

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

Prognosis

Enhance your diagnostic and management skills with interactive clinical cases. This app provides succinct explanations and key learning points based on real physician experiences across various medical specialties. New cases are released weekly to keep your knowledge current.

Highlights
  • Interactive clinical case simulations
  • Succinct diagnostic and management explanations
  • Key learning points for each case
  • Cases based on real physician experiences
  • Covers 33 medical specialties
  • New cases released weekly
Features
Read full description

With Prognosis, you can improve your ability to diagnose and immediately manage key clinical presentations associated with a disease, having access to relevant facts and succinct explanations behind the underlying diagnostic and management rationale. Prognosis is designed for practicing physicians, medical students, nursing professionals and other healthcare practitioners who love medicine and want to thrive as world-class decision makers. After all, practice makes perfect; and practice can be fun! Our catalog offers cases spanning a wide range of medical specialties, all which can be played in minutes. Each case is also accompanied by a concise yet comprehensive discussion of the diagnostic reasoning, as well as and key learning points for you to take home. Prognosis cases are based on the actual clinical experiences of more than 200 physicians across 33 specialties. New cases are released every week, often in keeping with global endemic and epidemic trends, to help you brush up on the clinical skills that are the need of the hour! - Best App for Health & Well Being - World Summit Awards, 2012 (https://www.worldsummitawards.org/winner/prognosis-your-diagnosis/). - 'Dr House for Doctors' - Discover Magazine (https://www.discovermagazine.com/technology/hot-science-18). - 'One of the five best apps for doctors' - Bulletin of The Royal College of Surgeons of England, Volume: 94 Issue: 1 (https://publishing.rcseng.ac.uk/doi/abs/10.1308/147363512X13189526438558). IMPORTANT: Prognosis: Your Diagnosis is designed for use by medical professionals and students. It is not intended for use by patients or for self-diagnosis.

About

PathoPlay

Learn disease and drug mechanisms through interactive puzzles. Connect molecular cascades, identify drug targets, and understand how disruptions lead to illness across 10 body systems. Offers daily challenges and offline access.

Highlights
  • Mechanism-based learning
  • Interactive puzzles
  • Disease and drug tracing
  • Daily challenges
  • Offline access
  • 10 body systems covered
Features
Read full description

PathoPlay teaches pathophysiology and pharmacology by mechanism, not memorization. Trace how diseases start, how drugs treat them, and how the same molecular cascades recur across organ systems. Can you connect the chain? Portal hypertension → splanchnic capillary pressure → fluid transudation → ascites. Every link matters. Miss one, and the pathway breaks. Now treat it. Five drugs in your cart. Only one hits the right molecular target. Choose wrong, the cascade continues. Now sabotage it. A healthy cascade. Five insults: pathogens, toxins, autoantibodies, stressors. Only one disrupts the pathway at the right node. Drop it correctly, and watch the disease unfold step by step. FIVE MODES Chain — Drag and connect steps from trigger to clinical outcome. Reverse — Start with a clinical finding and trace backward to the root cause. How attendings think. Versus — Two similar diseases side by side. Fill in the gaps that distinguish them. Treat — Drag the correct drug onto the right molecular target to block the cascade. Pharmacology by mechanism. Sabotage — Drop the right pathogen, toxin, or autoantibody onto the node it disrupts. Watch the cascade fail in real time. PLUS Mechanisms — Study horizontally instead of by body system. 28 immunopathology, toxin, and hemodynamic clusters span every mode. Daily Challenge — One new chain every day. Build your streak in under 3 minutes. 650 PUZZLES ACROSS 10 BODY SYSTEMS Cardiovascular, Respiratory, Renal, GI & Hepatology, Neurology, Endocrine, Infectious Disease, Hematology, Reproductive, Rheumatology — pathophysiology, pharmacology, and mechanism-disruption in every system. Sabotage highlights: H. pylori, HBV cccDNA, C. difficile, doxorubicin cardiotoxicity, anti-PLA2R membranous, falciparum malaria, prion disease, MS, Hashimoto, Graves, TTP, HIT, APS, HPV cervical cancer, drug-induced lupus, statin myopathy. WHO IT'S FOR Medical students preparing for USMLE Step 1 and Step 2 CK. Nursing students mastering mechanisms for NCLEX. PA, NP, and pharmacy students building clinical reasoning foundations. Anyone who wants to understand why diseases happen and how drugs work. WHY IT WORKS Most study tools ask you to recall facts. PathoPlay asks you to think with mechanism as the unit of reasoning. Five different ways to engage the same molecular reality builds understanding that survives exam pressure and translates to clinical practice. Every puzzle ends with a clinical pearl referenced to standard medical textbooks. From the makers of MedDiagnosis (clinical case simulator) and Kinetics (USMLE biochemistry). ACCESS 200 chains free across all 10 body systems One-time purchase unlocks all four premium modes, the Mechanisms browse, and all future content, yours forever No subscriptions, no ads, fully offline Evidence-based content referenced to Robbins & Cotran, Harrison's, Guyton & Hall, Goodman & Gilman's, Pathoma, Nat Rev Dis Primers, NEJM, and Lancet. Support: contact@diagnosticstudios.com Educational use only. Not for clinical decision-making. USMLE® is a trademark of NBME/FSMB. No affiliation or endorsement.

Screenshots

Prognosis4 screens
PathoPlay4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Prognosis at none against PathoPlay's 1. Prognosis also leads on ratings volume (3K vs 4). PathoPlay's advantage is ads (none vs shown) and rating (5.0 vs 4.8). On price and device support there is nothing between them.

Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Both are free to download. PathoPlay sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. Prognosis asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

PathoPlay holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.8. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Prognosis has 3K ratings behind it against 4, so its average is the more settled of the two.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Prognosis ships an update monthly, PathoPlay every 11 days. The most recent releases landed on November 1, 2026 and October 31, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard7 real differences · 3 level
Prognosis versus PathoPlay: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterPrognosisPathoPlay
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.8 (3K ratings)5.0 (4 ratings) — better
Positive reviews94.3% of reviews—
Number of ratings3K — better4
Update frequencyMonthlyEvery 11 days — better
AdsYesNo — better
In-app purchasesNo — betterYes
MonetizationAd-supported — betterFree with in-app purchases
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPad, iPod — better
Requires iOS17.015.1 — better
Further details — not scored
Size135 MB58 MB
Age rating17+17+
DeveloperMedical Joyworks LLCHelena Kaso

Bugs and requests

Prognosis

Reported bugs

3 issues
  • Slider says yes but records as a no
  • Login screen freezes
  • Incompatible with older devices

Requested features

6 requests
  • Download all cases at on click
  • Differential diagnosis before diagnosis
  • Reference ranges for lab values
  • Lookup function
  • Dark mode option
Show 1 more
  • Advanced analytics dashboard

PathoPlay

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

None

Prognosis

No in-app purchases

1 purchases

PathoPlay

One-time1
  • PathoPlay Premium$12.99

Questions

Is Prognosis free?
Prognosis is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is PathoPlay free?
PathoPlay is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, Prognosis or PathoPlay?
PathoPlay is rated higher. Prognosis averages 4.8 out of 5 from 3K ratings, while PathoPlay averages 5.0 from 4 ratings.
Do Prognosis or PathoPlay have ads?
Prognosis shows ads; PathoPlay does not.
Which is updated more often, Prognosis or PathoPlay?
Prognosis ships an update monthly, and PathoPlay every 11 days. Most recently, Prognosis was updated on November 1, 2026 and PathoPlay on October 31, 2026.

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