I am struggling to word this correctly, but we have a list of laboratory blood tests listed:
- Comprehensive Blood Panel
- Basic Blood Panel
- Liver Blood Panel
- Cholesterol Panel
- and many many more
These are all groupings of specific tests. Each of these can have some/any/none of the following lab tests:
- Blood Chemistry
- BNP
- Complete Blood Count
- Creatinine
- DNA
- Sed Rate
- LFT
- CRP
- ESR
- and so forth…
As per my example, a Basic Panel (metabolic panel) will include Blood Chemistry and maybe a CBC. A Liver Panel will include Blood Chemistry, LFT, etc. A Comprehensive Panel would include all in a Basic Panel and a bunch more.
So we have tests that can be shared between different test panels, where those will all contain the same metadata in each; meaning, a CBC for a Liver Panel will be the same as a Basic Panel.
My question is – would we be better off creating a Custom Post Type for Panels and then having another Custom Post Type for specific tests, and storing the CPT data for Tests as metadata in the Panel; or would we be better using a custom taxonomy?
I want to do this in the most efficient manner, but I do not want people to easily mess this up either. What are the benefits/pitfalls for using one or the other?
EDIT
I should add, I would like to be able to display the Panel, associated Tests, and metadata about each test on the front end of the site if possible.