Medcopia

Medcopia is a hosted subscription service that tracks changes to the ASHP drug shortages list and sends email alerts to subscribers whenever changes are detected.

Download

Medcopia is currently installable by cloning the Github respository:

git clone https://github.com/eddie-cosma/medcopia.git

We recommend setting up a virtual environment before downloading the required dependencies using pip:

cd medcopia
python3 -m venv venv
source venv/bin/activate
pip install -r requirements.txt

We also recommend installing uwsgi as a WSGI service and nginx as a reverse proxy to run the web portion of Medcopia:

pip install uwsgi
sudo apt install nginx

Configure

The default configuration is stored as a dict in the medcopia/config/__init__.py file. Configuration should be customized further by creating a medcopia/instance/config.json file to override the default values.

Warning

Make sure to replace the SECRET_KEY with a generated value. In python, this can be done, for example, using:

import secrets
secrets.token_urlsafe(16)

Example configuration:

{
  "SECRET_KEY": "prod",
  "SERVER_NAME": "localhost:5000",
  "PREFERRED_URL_SCHEME": "https",
  "SQLALCHEMY_TRACK_MODIFICATIONS": false,
  "MAIL_SERVER": "mail.example.org",
  "MAIL_PORT": 465,
  "MAIL_USERNAME": "medcopia@example.org",
  "MAIL_PASSWORD": "password",
  "MAIL_DEFAULT_SENDER": "Medcopia Shortage Alerts <medcopia@example.org>",
  "MAIL_PER_DAY_MAX": 5,
  "RECAPTCHA_SITE_KEY": "your_recaptcha_site_key",
  "RECAPTCHA_SECRET_KEY": "your_recaptcha_secret_key",
  "REDDIT_KEY": "your_reddit_api_key",
  "REDDIT_SECRET": "your_reddit_api_secret",
  "REDDIT_USER_AGENT": "your_praw_user_agent",
  "REDDIT_USERNAME": "your_reddit_username",
  "REDDIT_PASSWORD": "your_reddit_password",
  "REDDIT_SUBREDDIT": "drugshortages",
  "REDDIT_NEW_SHORTAGE_FLAIR_ID": "362c42a2-474c-11ec-bbd5-0ed2a92f10f6"
}

Note that currently only implicit TLS SMTP connections are supported. STARTTLS and unencrypted SMTP are not supported.

MAIL_PER_DAY_MAX refers to the number of signup attempts that are allowed per email address per day. This value is reset by reset_email_counter.py daily (see Install section below).

Testing configuration

A testing configuration can be used by creating medcopia/instance/test_config.json in the same format as the example above. When testing, set the environmental variable TESTING=True to use the testing configuration, to prevent emails from being sent, and to bypass reCAPTCHA.

Install

Medcopia is composed of three components that require installation:

1. A Flask web service called signup that displays the website and allows users to subscribe to email alerts.
2. A module, scraper, that scrapes the ASHP shortages list and checks for any changes whenever run. Changes are sent to users via email and submitted to the configured subreddit. This should be run once a day.
3. A script called reset_email_counter.py that resets the number of registration attempts for each individual email address in the database. Registration attempts are limited by the MAIL_PER_DAY_MAX configuration value to prevent abuse. This script should be run once a day.

signup web service

The web service should be configured to run on a WSGI. For example, if using uwsgi, you can save a config.ini file to the medcopia root directory:

[uwsgi]
module = signup

master = true
processes = 5

socket = /tmp/signup.sock
chmod-socket = 666
vacuum = true

die-on-term = true

This configuration can then be run:

uwsgi --ini config.ini

Once the WSGI service is running, a reverse proxy like nginx can be configured to point to the WSGI socket, allowing web access:

# /etc/nginx/sites-available/default
server {
    listen 80 default_server;
    listen [::]:80 default_server;

    listen 443 ssl default_server;
    listen [::]:443 ssl default_server;

    # Substitute your own SSL certificates
    ssl_certificate /etc/ssl/certs/your_ssl_certificate.pem;
    ssl_certificate_key /etc/ssl/private/your_ssl_certificate_key.pem;

    location / { try_files $uri @signup; }
    location @signup {
        include uwsgi_params;
        uwsgi_param HTTP_HOST $server_name;
        uwsgi_pass unix:/tmp/signup.sock;
    }

    # Substitute your own server name
    server_name example.com;
}

Restart nginx after saving your configuration:

sudo systemctl restart nginx

You can use systemd to run this config automatically on system start. DigitalOcean has a fantastic tutorial giving more detail on this setup.

scraper and reset_email_counter

scraper is run as a module from the medcopia root directory:

export PYTHONPATH=/path/to/medcopia
python3 -m scraper

reset_email_counter is run as a script from the helpers directory:

export PYTHONPATH=/path/to/medcopia
python3 helpers/reset_email_counter.py

These scripts should be run once a day. The easiest way to do this automatically is by using cron. For example, place the previous two commands in a reset_email_counter.sh file in the medcopia/instance folder. Edit the crontab file using crontab -e and add the following to automatically run the script every day at 03:00:

0 3 * * * /path/to/medcopia/instance/reset_email_counter.sh >> /path/to/medcopia/instance/reset_email_counter.log 2>&1

The same can be done for the scraper module.

Contributing

Pull requests are welcome. For major changes, please open an issue first to discuss what you would like to change.

License

This software is licensed under the GPL 3.0 license.

Disclaimer

This service is not affiliated, associated, authorized, or endorsed by the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists or the University of Utah Drug Information Service. All names and brands are properties of their respective owners.