AO Surgery Reference vs Paragon Mobile
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
AO Surgery Reference
Access a comprehensive online repository of surgical knowledge for fracture management. It provides detailed guidance on diagnosis, treatment, and aftercare for numerous fracture types, supported by extensive illustrations and expert review.
- 353 fracture types covered
- 172 surgical approaches
- 1222 surgical procedures
- Over 30,000 illustrations
- Feline, canine, and equine fracture care
- Powerful search function
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QUICK ONLINE REFERENCE IN CLINICAL LIFE Gain easy access to the award-winning AO Surgery Reference. AO Surgery Reference is an online repository for surgical knowledge. It describes the complete surgical management process from diagnosis to aftercare for all fractures of a given anatomical region, and also assembles relevant material that the AO has published before. It gives access to: • aid in surgical decision making for 353 fracture types • 172 approaches • 1222 surgical procedures • all richly illustrated with more than 30'000 Illustrations and much more. To ensure the quality of the content, it is authored, edited, and peer reviewed by experienced AO Faculty from all over the world, some of which are also well-known textbook authors/editors. This is a relaunch of the AO Surgery Reference app utilizing the same responsive user interface that was released February 2020. The highlights are: • Consistent navigational logic and user experience on all screen sizes • Inclusion of feline, canine, and equine fracture care • Combination of Preparation – Approach – Reduction and Fixation – Aftercare into one step called treatment. • Introduction of a powerful search function, allowing simplifications of the user interface as it replaces previous shortcuts.
Paragon Mobile
Provides clinicians with secure, anytime access to patient clinical data from their iPhone. This mobile solution enhances workflow efficiency for better patient care and business health by allowing untethered access to information.
- Rapid access to clinical data
- Untethered clinician access
- Efficient patient rounding
- Real-time data sharing with patients
- User-defined patient data views
- Audit reports of viewed data
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What if you could have a solution to help provide rapid access to clinical data anytime, anywhere? With Paragon Mobile for Smartphone™, you can. The Paragon Clinician Mobile for Smartphone™ application provides clinicians with access to information from an iPhone. Untethered to a PC, your clinicians can conduct more efficient rounding and be apprised of incoming information about their patients. Better access and flexibility — helping to improve workflow for better care for patients and better health of your business. Paragon Clinician Mobile for Smartphone™ includes: • Native iOS interactions and capabilities • The ability to share real-time data with patients • Ability to view patient data based on user-defined settings • Audit reports of viewed data Your organization must first license Paragon Clinician Mobile for Smartphone™ and be on Paragon release 12.0 or higher.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: AO Surgery Reference at 4.4 against Paragon Mobile's 3.4. Paragon Mobile's advantage is review sentiment (100% vs 86%) and iOS requirement (9.3 vs 13.0). On price, ratings volume, update cadence and ads 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
Both are free to download. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
AO Surgery Reference holds the better App Store score, 4.4 against 3.4. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 14 and 5 respectively. Written reviews complicate that: 86% of AO Surgery Reference's written reviews are positive against 100% of Paragon Mobile's, so the app with the better star average is not the one people write more warmly about.
AO Surgery Reference ships an update every 6 months, Paragon Mobile every 9 months. The most recent releases landed on September 24, 2026 and June 8, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | AO Surgery Reference | Paragon Mobile |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.4 (14 ratings) — better | 3.4 (5 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 85.8% of reviews | 100.0% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 14 — better | 5 |
| Update frequency | Every 6 months — better | Every 9 months |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Free | Free |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod — better | iPhone, iPod |
| Requires iOS | 13.0 | 9.3 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 1 MB | 13 MB |
| Age rating | 17+ | 4+ |
| Developer | AO Foundation | Allscripts Healthcare Solutions, Inc. |
Customer experience
AO Surgery Reference
Paragon Mobile
In-app purchases
AO Surgery Reference
No in-app purchases
Paragon Mobile
No in-app purchases
Questions
Is AO Surgery Reference free?
Is Paragon Mobile free?
Which has better reviews, AO Surgery Reference or Paragon Mobile?
Do AO Surgery Reference or Paragon Mobile have ads?
Which is updated more often, AO Surgery Reference or Paragon Mobile?
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