Award · 2024
Australia Good Design Award
Category winner in the 2024 Australia Good Design Awards for the drtalk dental communication and collaboration platform.
Digital and Interface category→ good-design.org§ Case study · drtalk
Six years, One product.
A first-to-market communication, collaboration and education platform for dental and medical communities in the United States. Designed, built and supported end to end by a ring-fenced Donnish team since the original app was conceived.
6 yrs+
Ring-fence team, fixed budget
Thousands
High-value users
2024
Australia Good Design Award
§ 02What is drtalk?
drtalk is a first-to-market communication, collaboration and education platform serving dental and medical communities in the USA. Its primary purpose is to build communities through secure digital channels, both at the organisation (practice) level and the individual practitioner level. With the ability to connect validated professionals, drtalk removes boundaries and redundant processes, and brings a digital-native experience to the desktop of the practice through its rich web interface, and into the hands of the practitioner through its native mobile apps.
This benefits all stakeholders in the ecosystem: frictionless, ubiquitous and instant communication, secure validated connection, simplified and intelligent referral management, and the ability to consume high-value education on the go and earn Continuous Education credits.
Now a mature scale-up offering, drtalk runs in Azure on a modern backend-for-front-end modular architecture using microservices and event-driven design, prepared for scale and performance as the platform continues to grow its thousands of high-value users.
§ 03Solution architecture
The kind of platform we build and run.
A genericised view of the production platform behind drtalk: native and web clients, a modular .NET service layer, a private Azure cloud, and the third-party services that carry payments, messaging, identity and media. The same shape carries any client.
Reference solution architecture: client applications connect through an edge and API layer to backend .NET services, a private Azure cloud and third-party services, with a reporting layer. The platform follows an event-driven, CQRS pattern: commands update a write model, domain events flow over Azure Service Bus, and read models stay eventually consistent.
Request / data flowEvents & notificationsOwned serviceOfficial vendor marks · third-party tiles link out ↗
Swipe to explore the full diagram
§ 01 · Client apps
Every surface a user, admin or partner touches.
Web appNext.js
iOSReact Native
AndroidReact Native
Admin portalBlazor
Signup appBlazor
Companion appBlazor
Marketing siteWordPress
Custom integrationsPartner apps · API
→
HTTPS / REST
§ 02 · Edge & API
Edge protection, then backend-for-frontend.
Edge
API layer
Core API.NET 8 · REST
Realtime & chat API.NET 8 · REST
→
Private network
§ 03 · Services
Modular .NET services. Event-driven, CQRS.
Storage service.NET 8
Caching service.NET 8
Notifications service.NET 8
Reporting service.NET 8
Notification hubs
SignalRAzure · live collab
PushExpo
→
Data / integrations
§ 04 · Cloud platform§ 05 · Third parties
A private Azure cloud, plus the specialist vendors for money, messages, identity and media.
Azure · private cloud
Cosmos DBPrimary
Cosmos DBChat
Key VaultSecrets
Blob storageFiles
QueuesService bus
Table storageKey-value
SignalRRealtime
FunctionsServerless
SearchIndex
App InsightsTelemetry
DefenderSecurity
Azure OpenAIGPT models
PostgresLogs only
Entra IDIdentity
→
Aggregated
§ 06 · Reporting
BI on the platform's own data.
Power BIDashboards
Architecture pattern · Event-driven + CQRS
CommandWrite model · .NETAzure Service Bus · domain eventsProjectionsRead model · Cosmos DBQuery
Writes and reads are split: commands mutate the write model, domain events flow over Azure Service Bus, and read models stay eventually consistent, so heavy query load never blocks writes.
Donnish · Reference solution architectureGenericised from a live six-year production platform
§ 04How we work together
A true partnership. Not a vendor relationship.
Our team has been involved with drtalk since the inception of the original communication app, more than six years ago. We provide design, project management, business analysis, development and quality assurance through a dedicated ring-fenced team. We also sit alongside the founders in product strategy, ideation, co-creation, roadmap and delivery.
drtalk was founded by two highly regarded dental specialists who provide market and user insight, serve as the final authority on roadmap and priority decisions, and own the budget. Everything else, from platform setup, administration and maintenance, to detailed UX and UI design, development team management and resourcing, deployment, release and support, is managed by the ring-fenced Donnish team.
We deliver using a dual-track agile model: just enough of the product is designed and approved by the customer to unlock the development team. This gives the client huge flexibility and keeps them in control of what the team is doing. Open Jira boards and backlogs make the work visible and queryable at any time.
Dr. Samual Frazer1:08 pm
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There is no area of the product we have not helped design, build, and support.
§ 05The team and the technology
The team
A dual-track agile delivery team built for ownership and accountability. Independent thinkers with T-shaped skills. No-one wears only one hat. Today they build with Claude Code for engineering, refactoring and tests, and design in Figma alongside it.
- Product strategyBrisbane
- Product and Project ManagementPerth
- Lead Business Analyst / QASydney
- Design LeadSydney
- Tech Lead, backendSydney
- Senior React developerBrisbane
- Senior backend, Azure and integrationManila
- Front end (ReactJS, React Native, .NET)Manila
- React Native developerManila
- Quality AssuranceManila
The technology
Hosted entirely in Azure. Modern backend-for-front-end with microservices and event-driven design. Touch points across web, mobile and admin.
Platform · Azure
- Azure Service Bus
- Cosmos DB
- Defender
- Power BI
- Key Vault
- Azure Queue
- Azure Functions
- Entra
Touch points
- Web · ReactJS with Node
- Mobile · React Native (Expo)
- Admin portal · Blazor
- Integration · C# on .NET 8
Integrations
- Persona · identity validation
- Stripe + Stripe Connect · payments, subscriptions, payout
- SignalR · real-time collaboration
- Documo · e-fax
- SendGrid + Twilio · messaging
- Giphy
- MUX · video streaming
§ 06Achievements
Recognition. And quiet wins.
Engineering · 30% saving
Xamarin and WPF to React. In one pass.
Successfully migrated the entire Xamarin mobile app and WPF desktop application to React Native and ReactJS, creating a reusable component layer that saved more than 30% of duplicate feature development going forward.
Australia · Philippines
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