Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Medicine/Archive 22

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Need help from someone with a particular textbook

Does anyone happen to have this source:

• Mitchell RS, Kumar V, Abbas AK, Fausto N (2007). "Chapter 4". Robbins Basic Pathology (Eighth ed.). Philadelphia: Saunders. ISBN 1-4160-2973-7.

It's one of the last things left on the checklist for the GA review at Thrombophilia. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:51, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

I have the 6th ed of Robbins in my collection somewhere... Nope, sorry, I have Robbins' Pathologic Basis of Disease. Sorry.Yobol (talk) 23:53, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

Actually it looks like my library has a copy. Is there something I can look up for you? Yobol (talk) 00:04, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

I have full access to that chapter in that edition. Shall I just check the seven cited spots in our article? I don't see a specific query on Talk:Thrombophilia other than the need to check the source. Happy to help. -- Scray (talk) 01:20, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

It is interesting that the term "thrombophilia" does not even appear in Robbins. It's certainly not a term I've ever used. -- Scray (talk) 01:29, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for your comments at the GA review! Yes, I'd love to have one fewer source to crawl through, and very much appreciate your response. This is really just a routine check, made more difficult because the source is something that no one at the article seems to have access to (which naturally means that the likelihood of finding problems as a result of 'editing drift' is higher than usual). WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:12, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

The content in question was added by another editor (it might have been Mikael Haggstrom). This is why I prefer journal articles of textbooks! JFW | T@lk 09:08, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Regarding your preference for journal articles over textbooks, I could not agree more. Textbooks are essentially a series of monographs with very little peer review. When an error is identified the mechanisms for reporting to the publisher, vetting by authors/editors, and then making confirmed corrections visible to the audience are weakly implemented (if at all). I've been somewhat baffled by WP's stance, other than the ease with people accept books as authoritative. -- Scray (talk) 17:14, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Update: Thrombophilia is now WPMED's newest WP:Good article. Also, I'd like to say what a great bunch of people we have here, with folks jumping in to solve problems and make suggestions and work together. Thanks. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:05, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Eyes needed

Doors22 (talk · contribs) is an SPA with a particular interest in finasteride. I've now had a couple of difficult exchanges with him, and would appreciate if others could have a look and offer their views with regards to recent edits. JFW | T@lk 10:14, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Conflict at MR Neurography

I wonder if someone could take a look at Talk:Magnetic resonance neurography. There's this doctor who's apparently involved in the technique, and has a financial stake in it, who's been editing this article for years. A newbie left me a note saying they thought the article looks like an ad for the technique, so I encouraged them to edit it and correct whatever bias they saw. The doctor's response was angry and hostile, they started reverting each other, and now I'm afraid the bitten newbie may already be gone. I'm not sure who's right about whether the article's biased, so it would be great to have someone neutral who knows something about MRI take a look. The doctor's pointing out numerous good sources to support his point of view that the technique is widely accepted, but is not in favor of allowing info about whether insurance companies will cover the technique, so it looks like there are no good sources for that on either side. I would love it if someone with a level head could take a look and potentially referee. delldot ∇. 18:19, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

It looks like delldot still needs some help here. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:07, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Depression (mood) citing emedicinehealth.com

Is this an appropriate source? Recent edits at Depression (mood) cite its depression page 3 times. The new content seems useful and appropriate to the article, but an informed opinion on that, too, would be appreciated. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 09:15, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Most of it looks okay. eMedicineHealth is consumer-grade but generally reliable. You could call it a "good enough" source. You wouldn't want to build a whole article around it, but I sometimes think it helpful to have a couple such sources in high-profile articles, because it increases the odds that an interested reader will be able to find a source that s/he can actually understand. It's perfectly adequate for supporting non-technical statements like the fact that treatments exist, etc. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:11, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

WP:PHARM

Consensus against merge of WP:PHARM

Should the pharma wikiproject be merged as a taskforce here? Am trying to improve the layout / style guideline and would appreciate further input. Discussion is taking place here and here. Also discussing the drug box here Template_talk:Drugbox#Proposal. Everything is in early discussion. I wish to attempt to apply a consistent format that emphasis generally relevant material more prominently but will not make large scale changes until consensus is reached. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 09:11, 27 March 2011 (UTC) Pharmacology is a medical specialty, but pharmacognosia, pharmaceutics and other non-clinical fields are not. I don't think a merge is needed just yet. JFW | T@lk 09:23, 27 March 2011 (UTC) Concerns where brought up that the project is nearly inactive. Thus why I propose it. But do agree.--Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 09:26, 27 March 2011 (UTC) I think we should be pragmatic about the projects rather worrying about the percentage of overlap of specialities. If WP:PHARM want to develop a styleguide that has any chance of making it into the MOS, it needs to be a project with many active members and a guideline that can show it represents the opinions of many Wikipedians and also reflects best-current-practice. Looking at the talk pages of that project, I don't see many edits that aren't by folk already in the medicine project, and I see only two editors actively working on the style guide. Colin°Talk 10:01, 27 March 2011 (UTC) I do not think WP:PHARM wishes to develop a guideline on their own. As Colin mentioned MED and PHARM are not two separate groups but the same group of people. I started posting there as I wished to makes some changes and it is currently unclear where this discussion should take place. If WP:MED need to be involved IMO it would be best for PHARM to than be a taskforce. BTW EMS is a taskforce but is an independent profession. --Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 10:37, 27 March 2011 (UTC) As I see it, WP:MED and WP:PHARM are partially overlapping, yet distinct projects. In addition, I see two types of drug articles. The first are substances that have not yet been approved for human use. These may be drugs in the pipeline or simply research tools. These would primarily be of interest to WP:PHARM. The second are drugs that are already on the market. These articles would be of interest to both projects. I am all in favor of highlighting the indications before the chemistry in articles about marketed drugs. At the same time, we need to make sure that the chemistry and pharmacology sections are not diluted. Finally I think the chemistry and pharmacology emphasis on drugs in the pipeline is appropriate. Disclaimer: I am a chemist. Boghog (talk) 11:03, 27 March 2011 (UTC) Physicians are still interested in medications coming down the pipeline. And yes we here should cover them...Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 12:00, 27 March 2011 (UTC) PHARM also covers veterinary-only medications, which is outside of our scope. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:33, 27 March 2011 (UTC) Which PHARM editors are actively writing and discussing veterinary-only medications? Projects exist so that editors can collaborate, and for that you need a decent number of editors and frequent postings. Looking through this and last year's PHARM postings, I think most of those would have been equally or better responded to by posting here. IMO there should be a contraction of wikiprojects as WP matures and some of the early enthusiasm has worn off. If we merge these projects then we'd get more eyes looking at problems and less duplication of effort such as tagging and style guides. A reason to split would be if WP:MED members complained that their talk pages were filled up with discussions on pharmaceutical, chemistry or veterinary issues that they weren't interested in and found distracting. I don't think that's likely to be a problem. Colin°Talk 20:01, 27 March 2011 (UTC) I agree with Boghog that WP:PHARM is as much chemistry as it is medicine. I'd like to know whether our chemists, eg. Boghog, Tryptofish and Beetstra, would put WP:MED on their watchlists, or whether we'd run the risk of losing them. --ἀνυπόδητος (talk) 10:13, 28 March 2011 (UTC) I always saw the pharmacology wikiproject broader than only medication (as indeed mentioned, it also covers drugs which are not for humans), and covers a part of chemistry as well (i.e. the biochemistry of how the drug does its job, and the multi-million industry of the development (the actual synthesis of the molecules) of drugs, many of which do not get onto the market in the end). Pushing it completely into WP:MED .. I think it has its merits on its own. I am following WP:PHARM and WP:CHEM because of the chemicals, for me, having WP:MED in stead of WP:PHARM .. I think that WP:MED for me, as a chemist, might be 'too much noise'. I am sharing the concerns of Boghog (pharmaceuticals are more than the drugs that are used on humans). However, having WP:MED people becoming more active on the medicinal part of the drugs would be very welcome, and I am sure that that would give new insights in what to do with the drug-pages. --Dirk Beetstra T C 11:43, 28 March 2011 (UTC) Also, I'd like to challenge Doc James' description of PHARM as "nearly inactive": according to Wikipedia:Database reports/WikiProjects by changes, it has been twice as active as WPMED during the last year. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:06, 28 March 2011 (UTC) Sorry I was just repeating what Colin had hinted at. If we are mistaken than I send my apologies.--Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:14, 28 March 2011 (UTC) I don't watchlist here, and I came here from the mention at PHARM. Actually, I've got enough on my plate without watchlisting here, so I would prefer not to. No harm that I can see in leaving things as they are now. (By the way, I'm a neuroscientist, not a chemist.) --Tryptofish (talk) 20:49, 28 March 2011 (UTC) Sorry, my mistake. I took you for a biochemist because of your userbox. --ἀνυπόδητος (talk) 10:00, 29 March 2011 (UTC) Oh, no problem! Biochemist, yes (albeit a bit out of date...); chemist, not really. Such are the subtleties of interdisciplinary research! :-) --Tryptofish (talk) 17:29, 29 March 2011 (UTC) Strong Oppose It's a separate wikiproject, and deals with articles specifically related to drugs. I see some overlap, sure, but it should remain separate. WTF? (talk) 13:38, 31 March 2011 (UTC) As a discussion, I don't really see a need for "Opposes" here, but for the record I am also strongly opposed to this proposal. Pharmacology is a distinct science that overlaps with and includes many subject areas, not a medical specialty or subset of medicine. Furthermore, the scope of WP:PHARM (originally developed when it was still known as WP:DRUGS) includes many other topics, such as drug discovery, pharmacovigilance, regulatory aspects etc. Our coverage of these topics may still be incipient, but that is no reason to fold the project into a seemingly more active one. I don't think that would be productive at all. Fvasconcellos (t·c) 16:16, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

Have started an RFC to get input regarding way to make our medication articles more accessible to the general reader

[1] --Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 15:53, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

Looking for opinions, interesting facts

I am giving a 25 minute talk to a group of dermatologists, and I want to entitle it "Wikipedia, Dermatology, and You". I want to talk about (1) what Wikipedia is and why it should be important to dermatologists, (2) the current state of dermatologic content on Wikipedia, and (3) finish with a basic tutorial on how to edit. With that being said, I wanted to know if the community could give me some suggestions on interesting facts/stats I can include in this presentation? I am looking for tidbits to really make the talk interesting. I am open to anything. For example, how many hits does medicine-related content get per month, and of that, how many does derm content get? Derm content makes up how many bytes of data? etc. etc. I want this presentation to make an impression. Thank you all in advance, and I will make sure to give credit where do for any brilliant suggestions given! ---My Core Competency is Competency (talk) 20:53, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

We have this page for all medical content [2]. We have this one for derm pages Total hits for project: 18,495,743 Total pages in project: 2,556 for the month of March 2011 [3] It also gives you the most popular articles for the project. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 23:10, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

Can we get Total page views for all dermatology pages on Wikipedia? ---My Core Competency is Competency (talk) 17:34, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

Got it... [4]

Thank you. Also, has anyone else given a lecture like this to physicians? What type of content do you like to include? Any good quotes, etc? I was definitely planning on including Jimbos quote regarding the "sum of all human knowledge." Any other thoughts? ---My Core Competency is Competency (talk) 17:33, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

High ideas are great, but I would not assume that these physicians are ready to be WP "true believers" (I'm not suggesting that you imply such an assumption - I'm just thinking it's a hazard in a talk like this). Docs are really good at seeing (or perceiving) an agenda behind a sales job, so I would avoid making it sound like a sales job. I like your comments above - they suggest you'll simply point out that WP is a de facto source of health-related information (for everyone), and inaccuracies have the potential to interfere with evidence-based health care. -- Scray (talk) 17:48, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

It might be effective to remind them of the fact that their own patients are reading Wikipedia, and so improving Wikipedia is a way to care for their patients. One of our UK physicians here reported (a couple of years ago now) that a patient appeared with a printed copy of a Wikipedia article that he had written himself, demanding that the patient receive the "right" treatment, according to the Wikipedia article. Fortunately, since he's written the article (and since it wasn't an unusual case), what Wikipedia said and what he thought best were the same thing. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:24, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

Here are some examples of presentations [5] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 03:35, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

Parkinson's mainpage

Parkinson's disease is scheduled for the mainpage on April 11-- please watchlist. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 12:48, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

That day is Parkinson's disease day, and receives lots of media attention. The article will probably receive many visits (with the usual amount of vandalism).--Garrondo (talk) 08:38, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Impact of medical articles

Not sure if we should be patting ourselves on the back here or not, but: diagnosis by Wikipedia. MastCell ^Talk 17:08, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

As long as it's an unstated "talk to your doctor about this" advice rather than "persuade your doctor that you have this" advice (like the DTC drug adverts do), it's not a bad thing. If someone panics and thinks they have Whosiwhatsit's Ohmygoditis, goes to see their doctor, and it turns out they get a diagnosis of diabetes instead, that's a good thing. If they reject the diagnosis and keep doctor shopping until they get one that agrees with them or starts taking medications that are dangerous and ineffective, that's more of a problem... SDY (talk) 18:11, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

It would appear that some thanks for the good press should be going to our very own User:Jokestress. Seems Wikipedia might be good for something after all. BitterGrey (talk) 18:46, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Whosiwhatsit's ohmygoditis - fantastic! I love it! JFW | T@lk 19:07, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Problems with the vitamin D article

My impression as a lay person from reading the article on Vitamin D was that it gives a rather one sided view on the controversy that seems to exist on using doses between, say, 2000 IU per day up to 10,000 IU per day. What is more serious, however, is the misrepresentation of sources and selective use of sources.

Today, I took some time to read this article, which gives the rationale for having a tolerable upper limit of 10,000 IU per day. But this was misrepresented in the article by saying that a researcher advocates that 10,000 IU could be the upper limit based on the assumption that intake of supplements and sun xposure are similar, but that is not the core reasoning made in the article at all (and it is not just one researcher saying this). The next part of the article then attacks the equivalence between obtaining vit. D from sun exposure and from supplements/diet. While that may be valid criticism, it does make misrepresenting the study arguing for 10,000 IU as the tolerable upper limit a sort of a straw man attack.

ALso, as discussed on the talk page, while the article mentions a study linking high calcidiol levels to ischemic heart disease, a study that critcizes this, is not mentioned.

I just made some corrections to the article (on issue of 10,000 IU/day as the UL), but I think the artcle has to be edited by experts who strictly stick to what the sources actually say. Also all points of view from the big experts should be represented correctly. Count Iblis (talk) 00:07, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

Ugh! Its full of non-MEDRS based assertions, some from primary studies, even some from news stories. I thought we didn't discuss dosages, but they are a major feature of the article. Needs some serious trimming of superceded work.LeadSongDog come howl! 02:45, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

Saturated fat and cardiovascular disease controversy

Has WP:MED seen this page? It makes me nervous for a variety of reasons, and would require a significant amount of expertise to sort through. I know Gary Taubes blames carbohydrates rather than fats, but I don't think he's mainstream just yet. WLU (t) (c) Wikipedia's rules:^simple/_complex 11:11, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

Tuberculosis' FAR

I have nominated Tuberculosis for a featured article review here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets featured article criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. If substantial concerns are not addressed during the review period, the article will be moved to the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Delist" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. GamerPro64 (talk) 22:59, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

Cancer charity 'tidies' Wikipedia

That was the headline of this BBC News article. The Cancer Research UK press release states that The Hallmarks of Cancer and Human papillomavirus have so far benefited from input by their writers. The former (written by HenryScow (talk · contribs)) seems good, but I can barely detect the changes in the latter.

According to the news item, the editors are being advised by Mike Peel (talk · contribs) from Wikimedia UK. I have contacted Mike for more information. JFW | T@lk 15:12, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Hi Jfdwolff, I was involved with the collaboration. There were a few other changes we made - see the page on the Wikimedia UK chapter wiki. —Tom Morris (talk) 12:27, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

Don't you think it might have been helpful if this WikiProject had been involved earlier on, rather than learning about this on the news? JFW | T@lk 22:55, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

Agree but better late than never I guess. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 01:38, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

I'm glad that this workshop happened, and I hope that more of these will happen. Thank you, also, for thinking to introduce them to this group, since we're their best source of ongoing support. I'll leave invitations to WPMED on their user talk pages, in case any of them login again.

If you have an opportunity to do something like this again, please let us know. We'd be happy to help. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:39, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

Patient information boxes

Hi WikiProject Medicine. Following the Wikimedia UK/Cancer Research UK collaboration recently, I've put up a proposal on Village Pump (proposals) regarding patient information boxes: basically adding links to governmental, non-profit and charitable websites which have patient information about particular conditions, diseases, treatments and so on. Your input is welcome. —Tom Morris (talk) 12:30, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

Is this more helpful than expanding the current {{Infobox disease}} or using the external links section? JFW | T@lk 22:50, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

I think it would be more helpful. External links can be problematic if the article is long and we really don't want the Infoboxs to get expanded too much. However, I do have misgivings about the non-profit and charitable websites part of the idea. Take the focal infection theory article for example; just what would be put into a patient information box for that article? Or what about the Bright's disease article which refers to a historical term? This is not going to be easy--BruceGrubb (talk) 09:13, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

Outlining presentation

Thank you all for your input about regarding the lecture I am giving about Wikipedia and Medicine/Dermatology content. Having said that, I have created a short outline from which I am going to write my speach, and which is included below. Would you add any additional topics/talking points?

• Outline

• My foray into the world of Wikipedia
• What is Wikipedia?
• Who makes a Wikipedia article?
• Motivations for editing
• Why does Wikipedia matter?
• Accuracy of information and vandalism
• Anatomy of an article
• Wikipedia communities
• Review of medicine content on Wikipedia
• Statistics about medicine content
• Overview of dermatologic content
• Intro to the dermatology community
• Statistics about derm content
• Challenges pertaining to derm content

Thank you all for your input! Hopefully I will get some new editors out of this! ---My Core Competency is Competency (talk) 16:16, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

The main thing I found difficult when starting editing was that I couldn't just write stuff that I knew. You might want to have a key point on its own dealing with the importance of sourcing, because that's so fundamental to how we work here. I think you'll find that telling an audience that they shouldn't expect to write anything on Wikipedia that they can't support by a quality source may come as a big surprise to them. --RexxS (talk) 01:01, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

DYK

The folks at WP:DYK seem to have something of a shortage of decent new articles to list on the Main Page. If you're planning to seriously expand a tiny stub, or if you're planning a new article, you might consider doing it within their five-day time limit and submitting it to DYK. Medicine-related articles are likely to be well-received, since they're not US-specific or pop culture (apparently the two commonly over-represented areas) and are generally interesting to most people. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:45, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

I have recently started the article Disorders of consciousness and will submit it for their review. Thanks for the idea. razorbelle (talk) 20:31, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

Copulation article -- Should it exist?

Opinions are needed on whether or not the Copulation article should exist when there is already the Sexual intercourse article, the two terms are largely synonymous, and the Sexual intercourse article already covers copulation. The discussion is at Talk:Copulation#Article in own right. Flyer22 (talk) 18:07, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

"Non-small-cell lung carcinoma" vs "Non small cell lung carcinoma"

More fun and games: Jmh649 [Doc James] moved it on 3rd April. Kwamikagami moved it back ten minutes later. Axl ¤ [Talk] 08:33, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Yippee, move warring!

Inappropriate ironic observation removed by editor JFW | T@lk 09:45, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

We've discussed this. Size is hyphenated when it's part of the name and not actually the size of the tumor. Just too misleading otherwise. — kwami (talk) 09:49, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Sigh, not really a move war. I moved it once and have no intention to move it again. I remember a discussion a while back where we said we would not be hyphenating all these terms as this is not what we do in real life. Let me see if I can find it again...Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 13:21, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Okay here is the previous discussion 1 and 2. There does not appear to be consensus for these moves. There where complaints here which was why I moved a couple back. I say we go with the ICD which does not use hyphens [6]. But really I cannot be bothered much further. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 14:57, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

We discussed this, and we agreed to follow the practice of high-quality reliable sources (e.g., the ICD) rather than the grammar rule book. In this specific instance, the reliable sources are divided—in favor of non-hyphenation, but still significantly divided—and other reasons will need to be considered.

I recommend that the decision be left to the regular content editors at that article (that is, to Axl and FeatherPluma, not Doc James or Kwami—or me, for that matter). And as a means of reducing complaints, I suggest that Kwami adopt a personal policy of never reverting any page moves on medicine-related articles without first discussing it on that article's talk page. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:25, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

While I support "small cell carcinoma", per ICD-9, I definitely don't support "non small cell carcinoma", which I don't see listed one way or the other. "Non-small" would seem to make much more sense to me, as "non" isn't a word. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 17:13, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

We need some consistency here. Should we hyphenate 'small', but not 'large'? We have broad agreement that these things should be hyphenated. As an encyclopedia, we should care enough for precision to hyphenate everything, but certainly here hyphens are critical for a general audience, even if those in the field are so familiar with the terms they don't need them. — kwami (talk) 19:19, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

The reason I got involved was the person who wrote this article Large-cell lung carcinoma with rhabdoid phenotype complained about all the hyphens here. He tried to revert once [7] but was reverted by Kwam. Discussion ensued. It appear to me that consensus was again the hyphen I therefore removed it here [8] as I assumed Kwan understood the consensus just wasn't willing to fix them. I agree WAID that the decision should be left to the main editor of the article. But what about the articles that do not have main editors? And if the main editors try is the project going to support them in their efforts?Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:40, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

There is no ownership of articles on WP. And it would be odd to have Large-cell lung carcinoma but Large cell lung carcinoma with rhabdoid phenotype. The same reasoning for one applies to the other. Even if we agree not to follow the MOS (or medical journals that hyphenate) on medical articles in general, many of us agree these should be an exception, due to the ease of misreading them otherwise. — kwami (talk) 20:30, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Nevertheless, an active WikiProject is entitled to form a consensus on issues concerning articles within its scope. The Manual of Style contains excellent guidance on general style, and I would expect editors to have very good reasons if they wanted to make local exceptions to MOS. This happens already for some aspects of medical articles and WP:MOSMED is accepted as part of the MOS. The regular editors here are intelligent and rational, and if several of them are indicating that there are good reasons not to have hyphens, then it would be better to make a case, rather than immediately revert. That is collaborative editing, and you would benefit from considering that first, Kwami. I would not want see a repeat of the debacle at Mexican–American War where after megabytes of text, the MOS (guidance) had to give way to COMMONNAME (policy). --RexxS (talk) 21:43, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Different articles are not required to match each other. And it looks like this is being discussed at WP:AN as well. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:34, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

"We have broad agreement that these things should be hyphenated."

— Kwamikagami

I strongly disagree. In the specific case of "small cell" vs "small-cell", opinion was divided, without consensus. Axl ¤ [Talk] 08:34, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

By looking at the comments I see 6 people expressing opinions against the hyphens and 2 expressing opinions for them. Feel free to correct me if I am wrong. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 10:42, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

I am also against the hyphenation ---My Core Competency is Competency (talk) 13:25, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

Hello everyone: I have been one of the biggest complainers about the "hyphenation situation", and I am the above-mentioned individual who wrote nearly all of the article on large cell lung carcinoma with rhabdoid phenotype, which was originally NON-hyphenated, but is now hyphenated. I put a LOT of time and effort into this article, and I'd argue it's at least as good a reference on this topic as you can find ANYWHERE. When I wrote it, I read and/or cited nearly EVERY English reference available on the subject, and I don't believe A SINGLE ONE of them had the hyphenated form. I also reviewed and cited nearly all of the references available in English on combined small cell lung carcinoma when I wrote that one, and don't recall any significant number of them having hyphenated forms. That article is an excellent resource as well, IMO. I've admitted many times that it's quite obvious that Kwami has a TON of expertise in languages, and I respect that greatly. That being said, I also RESPECTFULLY OBJECT IN THE STRONGEST POSSIBLE TERMS to hyphenating the name of ANY form of lung cancer pathological variant EXCEPT "non-small cell carcinoma" and "epithelial-myoepithelial carcinoma", because the generally accepted WORLDWIDE standard on lung tumor classification is the 2004 World Health Organization system, which does NOT use the hyphens. I never thought there was clear consensus for the hyphens on ANY, although some "votes" were closer than others. Personally, I think the WHO standard should also be considered in this as well, but leave the "weight" of the consideration to you folks who have been around a LOT longer than me.

Very best regards:

Cliff L. Knickerbocker, MS (talk) 03:52, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

Help: historical psycho-pharmaceutical knowledge needed

Hello,

This is not related to this wiki project but I am seeking some help in deciphering some notes from an old psychiatric case book. There's an entry for a man in 1956 who had had a leucotomy some years previously and who was restless and agitated one night. They gave him a drug the details of which were: 1 cc M.H.A. I.M.

So I guess it's one cc of a drug given intramuscularly. Does anyone have any idea what it could be? Possibly a barbituate? It may or may not be a trade-name. If it is a tradename it will be a European/UK one. Thanks. FiachraByrne (talk) 13:51, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

It's possible that someone here will know the answer, but if not, you might try Wikipedia:Reference desk/Science. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:36, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

Only thing I can hack out of Google is Monohydroxy Alverine - some info at http://www.e-journals.in/PDF/V8N1/201-211.pdf which indicates that alverine seems to be used as a muscle relaxant, and the citrate as an antispasmodic. HTH, --RexxS (talk) 17:25, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the advice WhatamIdoing, I'll post there in a few days if no-one here can figure it out for me.

Thanks for looking that up for me RexxS - that's one I didn't find myself. Unfortunately, I don't think that it's a likely candidate. It's got to be a hypnotic - that's the effect they were looking for and got. I guess it could be a typo or something as it's not one I've seen before and I can't think of any barbituate that went by a trade name in which those three letters would figure. Thanks again. FiachraByrne (talk) 02:25, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Yes, it's a tough one. A barbiturate that might fit the bill (partially) is methohexital (as Acid, rather than sodium salt?), but our article gives its patent date as 1959. --RexxS (talk) 18:17, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks again RexxS. As you indicate the date seems wrong but it's the strongest candidate yet. I've come across another reference to the drug in typed correspondence. There it is listed as M.HA with the same reference to giving 1 cc intramuscularly. It's not a major point, but it would be nice to know. Thanks again for your efforts it is much appreciated. FiachraByrne (talk) 01:14, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

New study on reliability of articles about the top 20 drugs

See Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Pharmacology. Regards, HaeB (talk) 18:57, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Andrew Wakefield, retraction of articles, and worth of "review articles"

An interesting article that deals with other studies that have cited Andrew Wakefield's fraudulent "research", questions about the retraction of such articles, and about the worth of "review articles" (subjective opinions):

• "Searching for truth in published research", By Stephen Strauss, CBC News, Apr 7, 2011

• There is a description of Strauss at the top of this article.

Brangifer (talk) 16:45, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

Nominated Danger triangle of the face for AfD

Yeah... Just wanted to let WikiProject Medicine know that Danger triangle of the face was nominated for AfD. Hello71 (talk) 00:54, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

Weston Price sources

Editors working on Weston Price need help with medical sourcing issues. Please discuss at Talk:Weston Price. Colin°^Talk 07:43, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

Megalocytivirus

Any virus geeks here? A new editor Fish nerd (talk · contribs) has asked for help at WP:FEEDBACK with Megalocytivirus. The editor has been given some general style advice, but I think it would be helpful if someone who knows a thing or two about viruses would please look it over and encourage this new editor with ideas for expansion and improvement. Thanks, WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:32, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

Graham is our resident virologist. This should pop up on his Watchlist soon :) Fvasconcellos (t·c) 21:13, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

It just popped up :-) These iridovirues infect, I seem to recall, bream and lampeye, and other genera in this virus family infect insects (and frogs, I think). They are not of medical importance, but the are important viruses. I will say hello to our new editor and offer my help and advice. Graham. Graham Colm (talk) 21:35, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. It looks like a really good start, so I hope that this editor decides he likes Wikipedia and sticks around. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:31, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

When I saw this section's title, I thought that it was a misspelling of "Cytomegalovirus". The naming organization could have been more helpful. Axl ¤ [Talk] 08:39, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

Talk:Scar ACE Inhibitor treatment

I hate to ask it, but could I get some eyes and votes on the validity of adding ACE Inhibitor treatment to the Scar page? I fear it's a wall of ranting text, but I've tried to summarize at the bottom where I ask for some votes. Rknight (talk) 18:51, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

Can someone help me with a debate that might need to go to WP:3O ? (one word, HOURS of debate)

Hello all,

Prior to possibly going to WP:3O..

I am hoping to get some help/advice from editors or admins that can direct me to the proper way of handling some struggles I'm having regarding the progress of a few articles I'm working on, in particular, "vasectomy".

I want to try and keep this short as I know everyone is busy!

I've recently (March/April) come back to the article and added a lot of content (I've been editing the article on and off for nearly 2 years).

I've been meet with constant opposition and resistance by a single individual forcing a virtual halt of the article's progress, at least as relates to my efforts because this user insists on taking the original text and either adding/taking away/changing it in a way that makes it either Unreliable, Wrong or Biased to his POV. The content edits, believe it or not are, in some cases only one-word changes, but the changes affect a different perception of the definition in re.

Any reliable editor can look in to the history of this article, and make their own assessment of what is going on, but sadly it's become a war of protecting the article from edits that:

• Are incorrect or misleading.
• Supports a bias toward a PVPS POV.
• Leaves readers confused and possibly reliant on bad information.

Hoping for input by other editors, possibly experts in the medical area(s): I feel that I cannot move forward until I can get some third-opinion input.

Following is a link to the current revision of vasectomy by me "Dijcks". http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Vasectomy&oldid=423276870

Following is a link to the version the other editor wants in place "Giancoli". http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Vasectomy&oldid=423121873

The point of debate is the word "sometimes" in the lead of the article. It's hard to believe but this one point of contention as led to hours of debate. There are copious amounts of messages and "talk" regarding this, but I think if someone who is in a position here to urge one or the other edit-states, we may just be able to move on. It is important to note that in this context, the word "sometimes" is misleading and may cause a great deal of confusion to a researcher, or potential patient. There is ALWAYS some method of tying or sealing of the vas, in a vasectomy procedure, although there is one method/technique where one side of the vas is not sealed. This method is not seeing mainstream use by virtue of limited data, and this editor's POV is coming in to play.

There are other issues with this editor's editorial bias, but the aforementioned is the most important one (I have tried hard to work with him)..

A good amount of this article's content has been added by me either recently or over time going back to 2009. Many editors take pride in the work they do here and I'm truly willing and happy to collaborate. All I really want to see is a combined effort of similar minds that will bring this article up, and hopefully as stated, it will reach WP:GA.

I may need similar help with the article, Post vasectomy pain syndrome as well.

It's gotten to the point that this is all I'm doing, is fielding this continued debate. Would someone be willing to come in and help a bit? Thank you in advance, Dijcks HotTub Pool 22:11, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

It looks like Moonriddengirl and Rknight have joined the talk page discussion. The talk page is not a model of calm discussion, and the article is now under full protection. From my skim, Giancoli objects to conclusions about the relative safety of a class of vasectomy procedures being drawn from (exceeding?) a Cochrane review, and the claim that there's such a thing as a "traditional" procedure style.

It looks to me like Moonriddengirl has the dispute well in hand, but if you have read http://www2.cochrane.org/reviews/en/ab004112.html then it might be good to put the page on your watchlist, just in case a fourth or fifth opinion is needed. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:31, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Drugbox/Chembox merger vs. two infoboxes

Could an uninvolved admin close the discussion at Template talk:Drugbox#Drugbox/Chembox merger vs. two infoboxes? I think the outcome is pretty clear, but I'd prefer it the formal way – this question (or similar ones) has been brought up quite often, and never led to anything. We really should start doing things this time. Thanks, ἀνυπόδητος (talk) 14:35, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

Melaleuca alternifolia

This article contains some medical claims and criticism directed against the NEJM. Perhaps some knowledgeable editors here could have a look at it, as it seems rather unbalanced and POV. Thanks! --Crusio (talk) 10:09, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

It looks like Doc James had a go at this. I'm sure it wouldn't hurt to have it on a few more watchlists. Also, it's pretty short, so if anyone has an interest in expanding it , perhaps with a {{Main}} section to Tea tree oil, that might be desirable. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:18, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Endocrinology of reproduction et al.

Endocrinology of reproduction (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Could someone please look at the edits of User:Lshanahan? They appear to promote a "novel theory" of aging, and link http://agingresearch.wisc.edu/ extensively. I'm a layman, so they may be fine, but the user's editing history here is fairly short. Thanks. --CliffC (talk) 04:39, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Should MeshIDs be updated to 2011

I was taking a look at the info boxes used in many of our disease articles and noticed that Template:Infobox disease is still using 2010, while Template:Interventions infobox is using 2007 when accessing the NIH database. As these templates transcluded onto thousands of articles, I thought it best to bring it up here. Is there a reason not to default to 2011. Kindly Calmer Waters 00:03, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

Seems like something that would just need to be updated and made sure it still works afterwords? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 16:47, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

Fixed. --Arcadian (talk) 02:35, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks :) Calmer Waters 01:54, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

Defining rape in the lead of the Rape article

Opinions are needed on the following discussion: Rewrite of the lead making the term difficult to define. I reverted James500's edits because the lead was already extensively worked out on the talk page, and James500's rewrite made the definition confusing and sloppy; not to mention...it defines rape first and foremost as the name of a statutory crime in England and Wales, Northern Ireland, Scotland and other countries...and he added text that clearly needed sources. Further, his tagging of various statements (with the tags "dubious"/"where?"/"who?"/etc.) are uncalled for. All it takes is tagging a section with one large tag. And when a statement says "In America," it is pretty clear where..."where" is. Flyer22 (talk) 00:56, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

I suggested a merge of rape and sexual assault as the medical literature anyway uses the terms somewhat interchangeably. Expecially WRT epidemiology a lot of research are not very precise on the definitions. I do not know about the legal literature. We could than spend the first part of the article trying to get our heads around how these terms are defined / used.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 02:29, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

I don't think that these should be merged. Sticking your hand inside a woman's shirt may be "sexual assault", but it is never "rape". Both the social and the legal literature show far more understanding of the variety of attacks than the medical coding system bothers with. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:22, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

This ref says it is "rape is generally defined as forced or nonconsensual sexual contact."[9] and than uses the terms interchangeably. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:11, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

The Oxford English Dictionary says "sexual assault n. the action or an act of forcing an unconsenting person to engage in sexual activity; a rape; (Law) a crime involving forced sexual contact, variously defined as inclusive or exclusive of rape." [10] And "a. Originally and chiefly: the act or crime, committed by a man, of forcing a woman to have sexual intercourse with him against her will, esp. by means of threats or violence. In later use more generally: the act of forced, non-consenting, or illegal sexual intercourse with another person; sexual violation or assault.The precise legal definition of rape has varied over time and between legal systems. Historically, rape was considered to be the act of a man forcing a woman other than his wife to have intercourse against her will, but recently the definition has broadened. Under the Sexual Offences Act 2003, in the United Kingdom the crime of rape includes the penile penetration of the vagina, anus, or mouth of another person of either sex, where consent to the act has not been given. This includes marital rape: in 1992 the House of Lords, in its judicial capacity, decided that the previous understanding (i.e. that a wife had given an irrevocable consent to intercourse) was no longer part of the law. Sexual penetration of a child under the age of 13 also constitutes rape irrespective of whether consent is obtained. In the United States the precise criminal definition of rape varies from state to state."[11]

So well originally restricted to sexual intercourse it is currently more broadly used. Will bring this to the talk page though. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:18, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

That "variously defined as inclusive or exclusive of rape" bit shows why the terms are not necessarily the same thing, though. Rape is a type of sexual assault, yes. But not every sexual assault is rape. That's the point WhatamIdoing was making. Most definitions and legal systems generally still stick to "intercourse" for defining rape, including the Oxford source you cited above.

And which talk page? The Rape article already defines rape as a type of sexual assault. Flyer22 (talk) 00:25, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

Much literature uses the two terms interchangeably. This is true of both the medical and the legal literature. For example "many states have renamed the laws of rape to sexual assult" [12] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:34, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

That still doesn't make them always the same thing. It's like I stated before: While rape is a type of sexual assault, sexual assault is not always rape. That's reason enough to keep the articles separate. But we'll continue this at the Rape talk page. Flyer22 (talk) 01:06, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

RSN on history of medicine

There are some questions about the discovery of viruses and other questions related to History of medicine and multiple other articles at Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard#Extraordinary_claims_based_on_not-so-extraordinary_sources. An editor believes that viruses and bacteria were first described in the Middle Ages. If anyone knows of some reputable sources on these points, it might be helpful. WhatamIdoing (talk) 14:51, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

If this goes the same way as the numerous contributions of Jagged 85 (talk · contribs) (see previous Arbcom exchanges) we've got a lot of work ahead of us. JFW | T@lk 15:35, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Source request

Would someone with access to the Journal of the American Psychological Association mind helping me out? The article is here http://apa.sagepub.com/content/57/6/1504.extract . I'd like to use any quotes it has about Suzanne Segal's experience regarding depersonalization disorder. Thanks very much. Ocaasi ^c 17:00, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

One paragraph discussing Segal, on page 1507:

"More recently, Suzanne Segal (discussed by the authors on pp. 142–146) has written of her personal experiences with depersonalization, which led her Buddhist teachers to validate her loss of self as reflecting a high level of spiritual enlightenment. Allegedly, she eventually recovered memories of childhood abuse. Once again, I would wonder if this illustrates the phenomenology of a possible dissociative disorder, rather than simply depersonalization. The authors write of patients whose chronic depersonalization had an acute onset, at a specific moment. In some cases this moment might represent a “switch” from one enduringly dominant alter to another (as occurs in some patients with dissociative identity disorder). The authors ask a key question: “How does an individual, over time, create a predictable, cohesive sense of self?” (p. 173). Imagine the challenge this presents to severely dissociative patients. I told my first patient who had dissociative identity disorder that our goal was to integrate her various “people,” as she called them. She retorted that this absurd idea struck her as equivalent to telling all the children in a classroom to become one person."

Yobol (talk) 17:16, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Digital hug. Muchas gracias. Ocaasi ^c 17:21, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

De nada. Yobol (talk) 20:38, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Talk:Laws regarding rape#Continuation of the dispute on this page

How to initially define rape has now been moved to the Laws regarding rape article. I have an issue with the lead not defining rape as "sexual intercourse/sexual activity without consent" first and then going into the state/jurisdiction stuff, as well as with how the lead is formatted in general (my view that it is messy and needs cleanup). Needless to say, opinions are needed. Flyer22 (talk) 23:32, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

Note: The full discussion about it is higher than the above linked discussion. Flyer22 (talk) 23:37, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

This is not really a medical issue but a legal one. JFW | T@lk 23:38, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

Rape is a part of WikiProject Medicine, which is why editors here have gotten into issues regarding that article before...through this talk page. I suppose Laws regarding rape has more to do with law, though, and so I will also post this to WikiProject Law. But WikiProject Law is not as active as this project. Flyer22 (talk) 23:44, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

Talk:Rape#Definition of rape / sexual assault

I know, I know...yet another discussion about rape at this talk page. But opinions are needed. A proper move/merge discussion would be best, though, to bring in the wider Wikipedia community on this. The discussion is about whether or not the articles should be merged/whether or not the Rape article should exist. Flyer22 (talk) 02:04, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

You've posted not more than a few hours after your previous thread. Please continue on existing threads. Further new threads on this topic will be removed per WP:TALK. JFW | T@lk 13:44, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

It's not the same issue. That's why I posted it as a different topic. I see Doc James has combined the sections, for your benefit no doubt, but I'm really not seeing the problem here...other than your possible feeling that rape issues don't belong at WikiProject Medicine (which I wholly disagree with). For goodness sakes, that article's talk page is tagged as part of this project, and it's clear why (seeing as rape is a medical/health) issue. Maybe the laws discussion didn't belong here, but this one does and is a separate issue than the one I posted right before this one. But oh well. Any future alert of discussions I post here about rape will be long after these sections are no longer on this talk page...and therefore will not be in violation of any WP:TALK guideline you cite. Flyer22 (talk) 19:26, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

Student project that isn't named very well, and covers content all over the place

Hello, I think the article Nitrogen Flow through Metabolism is a student project, but it seems like the article isn't a very well defined topic and could really use some additional input on how it should be named/advice on if it should be moved somewhere. If anyone could provide help that would be great! I am not sufficiently steeped in this kind of biology to make a good call, Sadads (talk) 13:01, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

It seems to cover the same principles as nitrogen cycle. JFW | T@lk 13:48, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

request for feedback

Hello, I am part of a team involved with the WikiProject United States Public Policy. My team and I would appreciate your comments and suggestions on our article Benefits for United States veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jgrandfield (talk • contribs) 00:29, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

MIM to OMIM?

Was just having a look at the Mendelian Inheritance in Man, sprucing it up a bit, and wondered whether it should be moved to "Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man" [13] since the latter is much more widely used in recent years. I have started a discussion there, in case anyone would like to comment. It's certainly notable since, arguably, Victor McKusick won his Lasker award for this activity. -- Scray (talk) 05:43, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

Seems reasonable. JFW | T@lk 22:11, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

Done - thanks. Just wanted to make sure I wasn't daft; it seemed uncontroversial to me. -- Scray (talk) 00:23, 21 April 2011 (UTC)

Hyphens a third time

There still seems to be confusion surrounding consensus on if we wish hyphens or not. From my reading of the above two main things where expressed 1) the person who is writing the page will decide 2) it should reflect the literature / ICD 10. Neither one of these is occurring. Comments... [14] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 06:39, 21 April 2011 (UTC)

Rhabdo time once again

I've been chipping away at rhabdomyolysis in the last few weeks, with some delays due to dreadful writer's block and loads of night shifts. It has now been significantly expanded, and I am planning to submit it for FAC at some point in the next few weeks. Before doing so, I thought I would submit it for peer review once again, so others can expose the errors that I have made (I have a blind spot for my own spelling errors) and suggest additions that might strengthen the article. Please offer your feedback here. Thank you! JFW | T@lk 18:11, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Would be very grateful to receive some further comments... Thanks... JFW | T@lk 07:36, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

Medical student outreach

Am working on a pilot project to promote Wikipedia at 4 medical schools across Canada (UBC, U of T, McMaster, Queens). I plan to combination this with a article writing competition / scholarship ($1000) with appropriate press releases / advertising. Am currently in discussion with UBC. Will need a group of medical editors to help determine the winner. This is being worked on as part of Wikimedia Canada with discussion taking place here. Organization is in its early stages. Comments / involvement appreciated. --Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 07:07, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

This sounds great! I think that Wikipedia ought to be part of every healthcare professional's education. (Specifically, enough of an introduction so that they know that any patient waving around a print-out of Wikipedia that claims something odd might have edited the page immediately before printing it, and that if the article still contains garbage, that they can fix it themselves on the spot.) This program seems like a step in the right direction. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:17, 21 April 2011 (UTC)

Talk:Sexual intercourse#Article is overwhelmingly dominated by human sex

Opinions are needed on whether or not the Sexual intercourse article should lean mostly toward human sexual intercourse. One view is that since "sexual intercourse" mostly refers to humans and we have other articles to cover sexual activity of non-human animals (such as Animal sexual behavior), then it is fine that the article mostly leans towards humans, similar to the Anal sex and Oral sex articles. The other view is that humans should not be given so much weight, since the term "sexual intercourse" also refers to non-human animals. Flyer22 (talk) 19:19, 21 April 2011 (UTC)

Redirect from "chronic fatigue" request for comment

There is a discussion at Talk:Chronic fatigue syndrome about whether chronic fatigue should redirect to Chronic_fatigue_syndrome or Fatigue (medical) with appropriate hatnotes to other articles. The discusion link is here. Comments and suggestions are requested. Thank You. Ward20 (talk) 22:45, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

List-defined references

I know that some of you are using WP:LDR to get some or all of the bulky citations out of the article text. (For those who aren't familiar with LDR, you name all the citations and place the full citations at the end, inside the reflist template. Within the article, you use the name for all citations [exactly as if each citation was the second use of the named ref, rather than some of them being the first]. The software doesn't mind if you use some LDR and some regular in the same article.)

It's kind of a pain to migrate to this version, but it's often nice when it's set up, especially in densely cited articles. User:PleaseStand/References segregator appears to offer a script that will help with the conversion. I haven't tried it out, but if someone knows about it, perhaps we can get a review.

(Insert standard warning about edit-warring over reference formatting here. Y'all know better than that.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:52, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

Concussion grading systems

Since March 19 the article Concussion grading systems has had this note at the top of the article. Is it just a matter of removing it? Not sure on the best response. Cheers. Jevansen (talk) 13:12, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

It needs to be merged into the article. ITasteLikePaint (talk) 13:33, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

Images

A number of image related discussions are taking place. Wondering if people could comment on the image at ADHD here [15].Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:36, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

Comments on Merging Invariant Chain with CD74

Discuss. Blahdenoma (talk) 05:58, 30 April 2011 (UTC)

Merge has already been actioned. JFW | T@lk 09:36, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Aphagia

I feel that, in its current state, this is a misnomer. It was originally a redirect to Dysphagia which from talking to a speech-language pathologist seems to be correct but I don’t have any citable sources to show either way. ITasteLikePaint (talk) 02:50, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

Compare [16] to [17]. The difference is that between difficulty and inability. LeadSongDog come howl! 03:54, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

Since I mentioned your WikiProject at ArbCom

I should probably notify you of a case that may of some interest here: Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case#Hyphens and dashes. Tijfo098 (talk) 13:38, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

Medical Coding?

Since Wikipedia currently has a template that includes a field for ICD diagnoses for diseases and other maladies, what does everybody think about using HCPCS codes for medical equipment and procedures? Would this be useless for non-Americans? --ThatNateGuy (talk) 19:20, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

Can you give a link to this? Not sure what it is.--Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 21:57, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

The initialism expands to Healthcare Common Procedure Coding System. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:14, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Never heard of it. ICD has procedure codes. In my experience medical coders here in Australia use ICD codes. Maybe its just a USA thing. I don't know about coding for medical equipment though. Mattopaedia ^{Say G'Day!} 09:30, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

Editor outreach and Research departments

I am planning on starting an outreach department for WP:MED. Will be working on formatting over the next little while. We have some funding from the Wikimedia Foundation for the Canadian part of this initiative here. The University of British Columbia is interested in being involved. Help as always is appreciated. Will post more as it comes together. --Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:18, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

The other department we could use is a research department. This could help us coordinate research projects regarding Wikipedia's medical content.--Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 22:00, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

The start of the research department is here and the editor outreach department is here --Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 22:38, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Nice work. I've been off-wiki for a while again (exams). When I'm done I'll look back in and maybe get some of my med students to take Doc James' survey. Mattopaedia ^{Say G'Day!} 09:25, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

Induced Pluripotent Cells Cure Disease

Induced Pluripotent Cells Cure Disease needs someone to look at it... 184.144.163.181 (talk) 03:41, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

TheHeart.org

Vdelso (talk · contribs) has made a number of additions using this website as a reference. We have been discussing on this user's talkpage why the website may not be ideal when matched against WP:MEDRS. I think it is useful for background reading but not as reference. JFW | T@lk 20:36, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

Without commenting on any particular edit, one of the things that's been on my mind is that the source needs to be proportionate to the claim. If you're making a trivial claim (oh, "Heart disease affects the heart" or "Severe high blood pressure can kill people"), then a pretty weak source really is sufficient. The more technical, detailed, or counter-intuitive the claim, the stronger the source should be. IMO this sort of website is—at the very best—a sort of medium quality. I wouldn't want to rely on it, for example, to say that treatment A is better than treatment B, or that X percent of people with Whosiwhatsis are successfully treated, but it might be okay for very general information. In that sense, I classify it with typical mainstream media outlets: they probably misunderstood half of what they were told, and they probably left out critical information, but the overall point is probably not completely wrong.

Providing the ideal source immediately might not always be our most pressing concern. In the short-term, it might be preferable to have accurate information from a non-ideal source, than to have bad information—or to have the same information with no source named at all. I'd rather have everything perfect from the start, but WP:There is no deadline for providing ideal sources. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:12, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

In my opinion, theheart.org is somewhat more reliable than a newspaper (such as the Daily Mail). I agree that it does not meet MEDRS's "Ideal source". WhatamIdoing summarizes well. Axl ¤ [Talk] 08:57, 30 April 2011 (UTC)

The Daily Mail has a negative reliability score wrt medicine and health: it is far more likely to be wrong and misleading than it is to be correct and helpful! -- Colin°^Talk 11:35, 30 April 2011 (UTC)

I think the editor in question is fully capable of finding the more appropriate MEDRS-compatible references. I have already requested this. In all honesty, those people who know how to read and understand TheHeart articles are also capable of finding good sources.

I agree that there is no deadline, but I get a bit tired when other editors (especially those who are capable of finding good sources) leave it for others to sort out sourcing. JFW | T@lk 09:33, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

" The Daily Mail has a negative reliability score wrt medicine and health: it is far more likely to be wrong and misleading than it is to be correct and helpful! "

— Colin

I know. That's why I chose it as an example. ;-)

From MEDRS, theheart.org falls somewhere between the low-quality popular press (The Daily Mail) and the high-quality popular press (New Scientist). Axl ¤ [Talk] 09:13, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

theheart.org is a new service for medical professionals, I do not think that should discredit any of their articles for many reasons. For one, they are HONcode certified, meaning they comply with the HONcode standard for trustorthy health information. HONcode is the oldest and the most trusted code for medical and health related information available on Internet (since 1995). Also, theheart.org have credible writers and contributors who have authority on the subjects they write about and most of them have MD's from ivy league schools.

"Popular press" is probably not the best source for information, however, organizations like theheart.org, or The American Heart Association do not fall under that umbrella. Instead I would say they are considered as "medical and scientific organizations" which have "statements and information from reputable major medical and scientific bodies" that can "be valuable encyclopedic sources." Vdelso (talk) 18:22, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

While several physicians from top quality medical schools (Case Western, Duke, Penn, Columbia, etc.) are listed as contributors, the meat of the writing is likely done by the "Writers"—most of whom are either general journalists or general medical journalists. I think the earlier analogy to not-bad-but-not-as-good-as-New Scientist is a good one. NW (Talk) 18:33, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Query User talk:Josabeth promoting Baha

Contribs [18] The Baha site [19] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 16:37, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

Another users who edits need reviewing User:ProfessorAM

I have reverted this [20] but others are questionable with respect to formatting and referencing. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:15, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

Neuropathic pain

I'm on a slow and tenuous connection and don't have time so can't address this just now but I'm concerned about this series of edits that makes the claim that

"vitamins like thiamine, pyridoxine, biotin, folic acid, methyl- or cyanocobalamin and vitamin E, minerals such as magnesium, zinc and chromium, the amino acids L-arginine and L-glutamine, and the omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids, as well as a few non-essential nutrients like myo-inositol and taurine, have all been found effective in both alleviating pain symptoms and healing actual damage in different types of peripheral neuropathy."

(my emphasis), which seems rather extraordinary. If it hasn't been addressed when I get back from the bush I'll read the paper, but could someone please tell me in the meantime whether anything is known about the credibility of the source, Alternative Medicine Review? --Anthonyhcole (talk) 20:07, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

Doc James (Jmh649) has reverted the edits. Axl ¤ [Talk] 08:39, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

Class of PT students from Queen's University

We have a group of Queen's University students editing PT topics. They will need a little guidance. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 14:48, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I've noticed. Would have been helpful if they'd announced their plans before going headfirst into a number of featured articles on neurological conditions. JFW | T@lk 22:59, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

Do they have a campus ambassador, or have they been dumped into a sink-or-swim situation? Is there a list of them somewhere? WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:57, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

• Not that I am aware. A few include:

User:Media pranks

User:JPBelakPT

Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 05:07, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

It would help to know who their supervisors are. Not all contributions are based on secondary sources. I've had to fix or revert some of them. JFW | T@lk 13:59, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

Yes I know. Have done the same. Have left a few messages that have not been responded too. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:11, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

User:142.20.198.169 adding links to a bunch of external links to www.aboutkidshealth.ca [21]

What are people feelings about this? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:11, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

Annoying and unnecessary. Must remove. Have left a message. JFW | T@lk 19:07, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

The couple I looked at fail WP:ELNO#EL1. External links are supposed to provide a "unique resources", such as more information than the article should contain. Dumbed-down-for-kids links basically never qualify. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:16, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

Hmm

List of human diseases associated with infectious pathogens - any thoughts? JFW | T@lk 20:37, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

It fails WP:MEDRS. All the stuff that does should be removed. That it is now being linked widely such as here [22] further reinforces my opinion that "see also" sections should be aggressively removed as they are primarily a place for a wiki user to spam their "favorite" page across the encyclopedia. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 20:43, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

Sounds like an AFD candidate, doesn't it? JFW | T@lk 21:04, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

This appears to be the place to put conditions that are only tentatively caused by infections. Some are claiming that most disease is infectious in nature but this of course is not widely accepted by the main stream. This content should be dealt with on its respective page. Combining it all in one spot is not really appropriate IMO. Not sure if an AFD would work as individually this content does have some support. I guess it is a WP:DUE issue. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 21:31, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

That list is painfully misleading. [By the way, I believe that most disease is infectious in nature. Perhaps you mean that some claim that most diseases are infectious in nature?] Axl ¤ [Talk] 09:08, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of human diseases associated with infectious pathogens - your views please. JFW | T@lk 15:57, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

Looking at some of the sourcing, it appears that it isn't a deletion issue, but a massive cleanup problem. SDY (talk) 15:22, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

Disagree, the whole idea is bad. Please commment at the AFD. JFW | T@lk 08:59, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

Heave

See Heave; what is the difference between a Ventricular heave and a Parasternal heave? Is there one? Kind regards, Captain n00dle\^Talk 23:00, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

Heave describes an abnormal palpation of the precordium. An abnormal apex beat is sometimes described as a heave (or lift), but right ventricular heave or parasternal heave is a separate important sign in right ventricular dysfunction, particularly when due to pulmonary artery hypertension.

Finding sources for this stuff is very difficult, as there are not many articles about physical examination. JFW | T@lk 06:16, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

There should be plenty of textbooks, though, and those would be perfectly fine sources for this type of information. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:18, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

True, but it means that many of these findings are actually anecdotal! JFW | T@lk 08:59, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

Adductor muscles of the hip

Often I translate medical (or anatomical)) articles from english into dutch for nl-wp. But the article Adductor muscles of the hip has, in my opinion, so many factual errors, that I wrote a dutch article anew (nl:Adductoren van het bovenbeen). Greetings, Nl-Koosg (talk) 07:21, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

Expressive aphasia vs. aphasia

Can someone with expertise in this area help me understand...

is Aphasia the same as Expressive aphasia?

If yes, then I think these two articles address the same topic.

If no, then can you help me understand the difference?

Thanks,

Wshallwshall (talk) 02:41, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

Aphasia is basically a neurological condition involving the dominant hemicortex (usually left hemisphere) of the brain involving the Broca's area or the Wernikie's area. The Broca area is usually limited to pars opercularis and pars triangularis of the dominant hemicortex and is the place where speech is generated. Damage to this region therefore results in Broca's aphasia, non-fluent aphasia, or motor aphasia, or expressive aphasia where the person is able to comprehend speech but is unable to generate meaningful speech. Wernickie's aphasia however is due to damage to the wernickie's area located in superior temporal gyrus of the tempral left dominant hemicortex, and damage to this area can lead to inability to comprehend speech or language, but ability to speak and communicate, and so is known as fluent aphasia, receptive aphasia, or wernickie's aphasia. These are often outcome of a stroke involving one of the major arteries coming of the Internal carotid namely the MCA (Middle cerebral artery) or its tributaries.

Long story short, no Aphasia is not the same as expressive aphasia, the same way that a Mercedes Benz is not the same as a car, even though it is A car, but to classify both in the same category causes confusion. Therefore Aphasia should be thought of as a class, and different subtypes as subclasses, namely expressive aphasia, etc. Hope this helps! Dr. Persi (talk) 19:16, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

It might be appropriate to merge them though. JFW | T@lk 08:59, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

Dr. Persi has it right that expressive aphasia is a subcategory of aphasia. I wouldn't be in favour of merging, as there is a huge literature on both topics. --Slp1 (talk) 11:53, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Medical FAC - please comment

Rhabdomyolysis is up for FAC (here). I've already had some marvellous input in the recent peer review, and I'd be very grateful for any further advice that will carry this one to FA level. JFW | T@lk 20:20, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

Overall I think it looks excellent. I made some minor copyedits, all of which you should feel free to revert if you disagree with them. MastCell ^Talk 18:01, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Historical context

Are there project guidelines for outdated treatments? I queried what seemed to me the slant of the sprain article, and am now astonished to notice that, while Galen falls within the WP:Med, there is no link to bloodletting from venipuncture. I dont see a task force on history of medicine; is there a separate project, as for alt. med.? Has this already been gone over in the (apparently unindexed) discussion archives? Sparafucil (talk) 00:59, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

I assume that you're asking about the presentation of an outdated treatment of a current disease, in the article about the disease. In that situation, we usually put the information about the old-fashioned treatment under the ==History== section.

WP:WikiProject History of science supposedly exists, but I don't believe that it's very active. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:23, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia med school

http://www.medpagetoday.com/MeetingCoverage/APA/26483: "About half of medical students see Wikipedia as a trustworthy source of information for helping them prepare for exams, researchers said here. Although study groups and preparation guides proved more popular methods of studying, 46.77% of 186 med students surveyed said they referred to the publicly maintained Wikipedia as a primary source of knowledge, Maryam Namdari, DO, who practices in Philadelphia, and colleagues reported at the American Psychiatric Association meeting here."

nothing new, just more in the annals of 'better get this sh*t right'. Ocaasi ^c 01:53, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

That's a pretty worrisome statistic. JFW | T@lk 20:00, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

WP:GA Assistance Request

Over at the WP:GA Natural Sciences page, we split the Biology and Medicine category. Can anyone here assist us in making the huge 100+ article subcategory into something more useful. In addition to this can you also check that we didn't leave anything in the Biology category that shoud be in the Health and Medicine category. Thanks for the assistance from the WP:GA team. Tarret ^talk 03:01, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Great idea. I think I even suggested this a while back :-) Will take a look... Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 03:23, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Heparin-induced thrombocytopenia is a medical article rather than biology. JFW | T@lk 06:44, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

New Student Group

Hi everyone, I'm an upcoming med student interesting in starting up a wikipedia group at my school. I'd been involved in a project in undergrad through wikiprojects chemistry and found the chemistry editors were less than welcoming, unfortunately. So I thought I'd test the waters here before hand and see if anyone else had done something similar. All advice is welcome! Goblueium (talk) 02:01, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

Welcome to Wikipedia!

You might be interested in the outreach:Wikipedia Ambassador Program, which attempts to provide WP:Campus ambassadors to help new classes/students. It looks like there are five volunteers to help people at UMich, and you might like to talk to someo of them.

As for our group—we like new editors, we know that we need more people to help improve content, and I think WikiProject Medicine is one of the better groups around. That said, we tend to follow a high standard for sourcing—often aiming higher than is technically required by the guidelines for medicine-related content—and we're not afraid to tell someone if we think something could be done better. (This isn't supposed to be a one-sided system; we hope that you'll do the same for us whenever we fall short of the mark.)

If you're looking for a focus area, you might look at the articles listed at Wikipedia:WikiProject Medicine/Google Project. About a year ago, the Google Foundation paid professionals to review the articles and leave detailed comments on how to correct or improve the contents. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:34, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

While here is hoping UMich can get more people involved. Would be a good idea to get someone to speak to a group about editing before they start. Especially WP:MEDRS and WP:MEDMOS.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 06:05, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

Glad to hear that everyone here seems more welcoming than some other experiences I've had. I'm actually graduating from Michigan and going to a school with no campus ambassadors, so it should be interesting. Thanks for the advice, I'm sure I'll be back for more later. Goblueium (talk) 01:24, 26 May 2011 (UTC) (formerly UMich215SSG)

Radiology images

There is a great source of radiology images here [23] the key will be convincing some of them to release them in a form we can use... I bring this site up as the people who have contributed to it have give the company the owns it rights to use it for commercial purposes. Thus many of them may be willing to release it under a license that allows commercial us. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:30, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Lists of causes - how to do it

As part of the work on rhabdomyolysis I have been discussing with Axl the way in which we should be presenting lists of causes for particular conditions. On the rhabdo peer review we considered the merits of grouping causes according to a "surgical sieve". In this case, I wasn't sure if that was going to make things more straightforward. I opened a discussion on WT:MEDMOS, where we've had limited response (apart from WhatamIdoing - thank you). I am concerned that this is going to stop rhabdomyolysis from reaching FA, and would be very grateful for views from others (probably on the MEDMOS page). JFW | T@lk 10:22, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Diberri's ref tool

User:Diberri's ref tool appears to have been down for over a week. The Universal Reference Formatter on the toolserver doesn't work for me; I get a message that it's "Trying to expand citation info using CrossRef... ", but it never does. Are there other options for those of us who don't want to type out everything (and that actually result in a full citation directly in the article)? WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:29, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Just above where we type text there is a line with a "cite" on it. If you turn it down a "templates" box appears. You click on said box and go down to "cite journal" enter the PMID and hit the search thing. Works for me. --Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:02, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Back when Diberri's webpage was down, I wrote a small Windows-based tool to do the same thing (take a PubMed ID, grab the bibliographic information, and format it into a {{cite journal}} template for cut-and-pasting). If anyone wants a copy, I'd be happy to send it along. It's a standalone Windows desktop application written in C#/.NET, although it would be simple enough to write the same thing in Java so it could run on Macs/Linux/etc. It's just been for personal use, so I haven't tested it thoroughly and it's not as full-featured as Diberri's webpage, but it's worked for me. On the other hand, if the citation toolbar already contains an option, that's probably the way to go. MastCell ^Talk 17:10, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Try this tool. (Based upon the length of the field, it detects if it is a PMID or ISBN.) --Arcadian (talk) 19:10, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Nice - that looks quite handy. MastCell ^Talk 20:44, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Image

We are having an issue with a user removing the lead image at cystic fibrosis. Comments? Talk:Cystic fibrosis Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 01:23, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

GA reviewer sought

The article on Management of traumatic memories was improved by an educational project earlier this year. The project has run its course and the original authors no longer seem to be active, so I have submitted it to Good Article review myself. To review, follow the instructions at WP:GAC. MartinPoulter (talk) 13:08, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

How is this different than PTSD? We do not even have a page on Traumatic memories. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 23:46, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

More opinions requested at Talk:Cystic_fibrosis

We're discussing suitable and unsuitable images for the lead infobox of Cystic fibrosis, and more opinions and ideas would be very welcome. The conversation is ongoing at Talk:Cystic_fibrosis#Image_in_lead. Badger Drink (talk) 16:47, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

COI

FYI, there's a complaint about Functional medicine at WP:Conflict of interest/Noticeboard. If anyone knows anything about this and wants to clean up the article, I'm sure it would count as your Good deed for the day. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:46, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

It's a disguised advertisement and should be deleted. Looie496 (talk) 01:05, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

Or at least presented as "alt med" which is what it appears to be. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 01:17, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

We need to Wikilink and improve articles related to current fatal epidemic of Shiga toxin-producing E coli (STEC)

"World's largest E coli outbreak kills 14 in Germany" - http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/may/30/ecoli-outbreak-death-toll

Journalists and the general public will be coming to Wikipedia to get information about this.

Our articles on the relevant subjects are poorly cross-linked.

We primarily just need some light editing to add relevant Wikilinks. (Also of course add any additional relevant content.) (If you can edit in another language, please check other-language Wikipedias as well.)

I'll be AFK for a while and can't do this myself.

A few relevant articles - Escherichia coli - Hemolytic-uremic syndrome - Shiga toxin

Thanks. -- 186.221.141.36 (talk) 18:41, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. Will take a look at HUS. We definitely will definitely keep it more encyclopedic in nature than the Guardian "World's Largest". With a grand total of 14 dead. There are a few tropical disease more in need of work.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:00, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

BTW hopefully someone can find an image for the page such as the ones seen here [24] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:05, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

Found a peripheral blood smear on commons. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:11, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

I can't spare much time for content editing (as usual), but I've whipped up some images for the Shiga toxin and HUS articles. Perhaps they can be of use in other Wikis as well. Fvasconcellos (t·c) 03:42, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

I have made an article on Shiga-like toxin-producing Escherichia coli. Speciate (talk) 11:44, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Need contributors !

Hello everyone,

I have just taken part in the conversation on the introduction of circumcision (WHO and CDC statements). I have made suggestions. But the problem is that WP:NOTYOURS is not respected. It must come from other contributors on the discussion page to give their opinion (even briefly). Thank you!--Galateo46 (talk) 14:03, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

Usage by physicians in Europe

They are saying 60%[25] --Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:38, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

Negative pressure wound therapy

Hello there, I was pointed to this page as a possible source of help with a draft I've written for the Negative pressure wound therapy (NPWT) article. As explained at greater length in messages on my talk page and on the NPWT talk page, I've written a fairly long draft that adds a lot of information and reliable citations to the current article, and I am looking for help reviewing the draft and making edits to the article. You can read my draft here:

• Draft Negative pressure wound therapy article

I'd just like to mention that I do have a working relationship with KCI, a firm that develops NPWT technology, and I know that this means there's a potential COI for any changes I make myself. That's why (although I've been careful to follow Wikipedia's guidelines) I'd like to ask that other editors to review my draft and give me constructive comments. Please take a look at my draft and let me know if there's anything that I need to work on, or if you think it might be ready to replace the current article. And if you've got any questions about the material or KCI, I'd be only too happy to answer them. Cheers, BexarTech (talk) 17:43, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Following the advice of another editor (responding to a help request on my user talk page), I've moved my draft over to the Negative pressure wound therapy article. If you've got any questions or suggestions about the article, I'll be happy to respond on the talk page there or on my user talk. Cheers, BexarTech (talk) 14:58, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

New / expanded template for procedures and interventions

With the help of a couple of other Wikipedians have improved the Template:Interventions infobox. An example can be seen here on the page Circumcision Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 08:04, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Also have created an info box for diagnostics (labs, imaging, etc.) Template:Diagnostic infobox Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 08:52, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Eyes needed

Jacob Kevorkian has died. Extra eyes on the article will be needed for a while.LeadSongDog come howl! 13:04, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Project Scope Issues

I see some hightly technical articles with words like pathophysiology of...I propose a policy that all gateway medical articles be accessible to the general public and incorporate highly technical material by reference to a medical wiki. See Online_medical_wiki_encyclopedia Find a cooperative site or propose one to wikimedia. Hierarchy is needed in the infospace, not anarchy. I'm sure those medical wikis need help. Don't reinvent the wheel - connect us to the wheel. Codwiki (talk) 23:09, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes I have been in discussion with all the wikis mentioned in the article you link. Most are just mirrors of Wikipedia content ( some without proper attributions ). I have invited them to come work with us and not "reinvent the wheel" as you mentioned. They however where not willing. Thus we are where we are. These other wikis do not have the some templating abilities and image managing abilities as here. If you can get them to join us that would be great. We would appreciated the help. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:02, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Why not just use Wiktionary? Ocaasi ^{t | c} 00:06, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

IMO we can do all of the above here, but I think that some of us get sloppy (we write for ourselves, rather than for our readers) and some of us may think that since our highly technical sources use a given writing style, then that's the "right" way to do it (or perhaps we're trying to show off how smart we are, or perhaps we're following the source's style because we really don't understand the information and thus can't explain it in plain English). We give some advice about not screwing up this way at WP:MEDMOS#Writing_for_the_wrong_audience, but there will always be a need for people to click that edit button and make the page accessible to our readers. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:29, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes a work in progress definitely and more help is needed.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 02:53, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Eyes Needed

There are significant changes being made to circumcision that dilute the neutral stance by removing a general global medical association statement on the medical merits of neonatal circumcision in the West.Earthsales5 (talk) 03:32, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

These statements are in the body of the text. The issue it appears is that some wish statements by regional bodies to appear in the lead. But will let others comment. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 03:53, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Here is what Doc James removed from the lead:

There is controversy regarding circumcision. Schoen states that circumcision provides important health advantages which outweigh the risks, has no substantial effects on sexual function, has a low complication rate when carried out by an experienced physician, and is best performed during the neonatal period.[11] Milos and Fayre state that circumcision adversely affects penile function and sexual pleasure, is justified by medical myths, is extremely painful, and is a violation of human rights.[12]

"The American Medical Association report of 1999, which was "…confined to circumcisions that are not performed for ritualistic or religious purposes," states that "Virtually all current policy statements from specialty societies and medical organizations do not recommend routine neonatal circumcision, and support the provision of accurate and unbiased information to parents to inform their choice."[13]"

And he instead installs:

"Circumcision reduces the risk of HIV infection in populations that are at high risk.[11] Evidence among heterosexual men in sub-Saharan Africa shows a decrease risk of between 38 and 66% over 2 years[12] and in this population it appears cost effective.[13] Evidence of benefit in developed countries and among men who have sex with men is yet to be determined.[14][15]"

Doc James last sentence is not supported by the references and is presumptive.Earthsales5 (talk) 17:30, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

I'd have strongly considered removing the 1999 source, since it's rather out of date. Up-to-date medical sources is usually defined as sources no more than five or ten years old. I believe that the updated information (demonstrated to reduce risk in sub-Saharan Africa, no decent studies published elsewhere) is a reasonably accurate description of the current state of things. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:25, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

The AMA statement refers to global medical association positions, which have not changed. 1999 is only 12 years ago. The basic AMA statement has been affirmed recently by three national assosciations, two in 2010. HIV doesn't belong in the lede of Circumcision.Earthsales5 (talk) 18:56, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Why shouldn't it be in the lead? Most of the recent sources about circumcision, especially in the general press, are about the relationship between HIV prevention and circumcision. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:19, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Wiki isn't a blog of recent news. Yes, studies show public benefit might be seen where incidence exdeeds 3% in a population (WHO/UNAIDS). That's not the case in the West. Note the WHO/UNAIDS publication is 2007. I.E. only part of Africa, and small pockets (IV users) in the West. Other benefits are recognized as more important, and they are properly carried in the body. Along with full information on HIV and infection rates. So you think it belong in the lede?Earthsales5 (talk) 21:30, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Review publications are neither "recent news" or "blogs". They are a reflection of scientific opinion on a topic. They form the foundation of Wikipedia sourcing. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 04:31, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

User is now blocked as a sock puppet.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 07:20, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Request for comment - Santorum (neologism)

• Santorum (neologism)

Request for Comment discussion started, please see Talk:Santorum_(neologism)#Proposal_to_rename.2C_redirect.2C_and_merge_content.

Thank you for your time, -- Cirt (talk) 14:35, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

I do not believe that this article is in the scope of WikiProject Medicine. Axl ¤ [Talk] 16:22, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Agree, completely out of scope.LeadSongDog come howl! 16:45, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Please leave us out of that. What's medical there? JFW | T@lk 23:07, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

2011 E. coli O104:H4 outbreak

People are adding all kinds of Original Research to 2011 E. coli O104:H4 outbreak. Some of the how-to advice is dangerous to the public health. Please watchlist it! Speciate (talk) 19:20, 6 June 2011 (UTC)

Sigh. We need more competent people...--Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 07:18, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

On a side note, if someone wants to write an article on toxicoinfection it might be a timely piece. I'm really only aware of the existence and general idea, but in the context of EHEC it might be a good one to have. SDY (talk) 01:12, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

Naming

Could people weight in here Talk:Electromagnetic_hypersensitivity#Please_revert_the_undiscussed_move regarding article naming. The question is should we go with the most recent review article and the WHO or use a historical term.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 01:35, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Identifiable images

A recent Resolution:Images of identifiable people proposed that the guidelines at Commons:Photographs_of_identifiable_people be strengthend and enforced. I have added a discussion section on the issues of identification wrt medical images here. Members of this project may wish to contribute to that discussion. Colin°^Talk 08:14, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Firefox tool to format PubMed citations

I've been working on a small add-on to Firefox to make it quicker and easier to format medical references. The add-on works like this: you just highlight a PubMed ID number (or any number) in the text of your browser window and right-click (or whatever the Mac equivalent is?) The pop-up menu will contain an option saying: "Format PubMed ID for Wikipedia...". Select it and a box will pop up with the formatted reference (in {{cite journal}} format), which you can cut & paste into the article.

It sounds a bit complex, but I've found it saves a ton of time since you don't have to juggle any additional windows to format PubMed ID's. You just right-click the ID number from PubMed, and you get a formatted reference ready to paste into an article. It calls Diberri's citation-formatting tool behind the scenes, so it won't work if that tool is down, but it seems to be working fine at the moment.

Anyhow, I'm still ironing out a few final issues, and it's not particularly polished, but it works for me on Firefox 4.0.1 (haven't tested older versions). If you're interested, let me know... I may see about uploading it to the Mozilla add-on repository, or I can just send you the installation instructions, which are simple (and the source code, if you like). MastCell ^Talk 17:08, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Should we comment here then? I for one would definitely be interested in using this. NW (Talk) 17:12, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Count me in as interested as well. Yobol (talk) 17:13, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

I use Firefox at home. I am interested. Although I am reluctant to "beta-test" developing software. Axl ¤ [Talk] 17:42, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Sounds great. Count me in! JFW | T@lk 19:24, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Is it possible to make it for chrome aswell? I use firefox sometimes but using chrome more and as soon as their new laptops come out I am getting one. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 06:19, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

A bit off-topic, but I also updated the bookmarklet at User:Wouterstomp/Bookmarklet. You can add it to your bookmarks and click when on a pubmed page to get the corresponding citation (and it should work in any browser). --WS (talk) 08:35, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

• Thanks for the interest. I'm wrapping up a grant under deadline, but next week I'll polish up the add-on and distribute it to anyone who's interested. I understand the reluctance to beta-test - I'd be happy for any feedback, but there's no obligation to sink any time into it. If it doesn't do what you want, you can just remove it through the Firefox Add-Ons panel and be done with it. I can't say I've done much with Google Chrome - they have a totally separate system for developing browser extensions, and apparently they want you to pay $5 for the privilege of hacking Chrome (!)

  Wouterstomp's bookmarklet is a cool solution that should work across various browsers - I didn't think of that. You have to be a little bit careful in that you should only use bookmarklets on pages you know are legit (such as the PubMed site); there's a small security risk in using them on untrusted pages, although I don't know that it's been exploited in the wild and I'm not even sure it's particularly feasible. Overall, the bookmarklet might be the way to go. MastCell ^Talk 16:16, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Trevor Marshall and the Marshall protocol

Hello project,

Anyone interested in sarcoidosis, vitamin D or fringe medical theories, would it be possible to solicit your input at Trevor Marshall? Thanks, WLU (t) (c) Wikipedia's rules:^simple/_complex 11:01, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Adrenal gland

I saw this change on an article that has previously been subjected to vandalism. I am not sure whether is vandalism or just someone being unclear. If an editor who knows something could have a look... Yaris678 (talk) 12:18, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

It lacks a source but looks legit. JFW | T@lk 13:08, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. Yaris678 (talk) 13:44, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Update of circumcision

Have recently updated circumcision with recent review article. There seems to be some issues. Wondering if people could comment. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 20:14, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Saying there are issues is an understatement. The complete set of pages needs purging. Richiez (talk) 09:25, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

RfC began here [26] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 15:52, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Category that worries me

Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2011 June 1#Category:Idiopathic diseases

This category (idiopathic diseases) is going to be a battleground. I am personally uncertain when to include a condition into that category or not. If a condition is partially understood, does it belong there? If the cause is known but the mechanism unclear, does it belong there? I think it is a very unhelpful category. JFW | T@lk 06:44, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

I've added links to the old AFDs, back when the cat's creator was trying to present this information in a list. Most people involved in that discussion don't seem to understand how few medical conditions (except infectious diseases) have known, accepted etiologies that explain all cases. (Simple example: smoking causes lung cancer. But people who never smoked get lung cancer too, and nobody really knows why. Lung cancer in those people is therefore an idiopathic condition.)

I suspect that we're going to be stuck with this "spam bait" of a category anyway, so editors might want to keep an eye out for it being added to articles. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:11, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

Digestive tract image

It looks to me like the submandibular & sublingual glands are mislabelled. Axl ¤ [Talk] 22:05, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Seems to have been introduced in the latest version of the file. Should be an easy fix. Fvasconcellos (t·c) 03:33, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Done—also fixed some strange font issues in the "Small intestine" labels. Fvasconcellos (t·c) 03:36, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. Axl ¤ [Talk] 14:56, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Other medical wikis

I have just reviewed the reach of other medical wikis. All (medpedia, askdrwiki, gandgyf, and wikidocs) have had a fall in popularity over the last 1 year except us :-) Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 01:20, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Really curious what might be driving that. Are we relatively or absolutely better than them. I'm still giggling about the Wiki that is supposedly supported by several universities and has an editorial board full of cardiologists. JFW | T@lk 05:59, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes I was discussing off wiki with someone who supposedly knows the issues. They are supposedly not in fact supported by the Universities they have listed (I have not myself however called the Universities to verify). Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 15:27, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

FAR notice

I have nominated Tooth development for a featured article review here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets featured article criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. If substantial concerns are not addressed during the review period, the article will be moved to the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Delist" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Dana boomer (talk) 15:46, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Help with two editors

User:T020 and User:DocOfSoc are adding none review articles as references. Both may turn out to be good editors with a bit of guideance. Wonder if people could give them a second opinion. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:24, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

Redlink

In other news, lifetime risk is a redlink, which it oughtn't be. Some five dozen medicine-related articles ought to link to it. I'm inclined to redirect it to a broader article that could be slightly expanded to include a short description of this concept. Anybody have a favorite target in mind? WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:33, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, there are several important medical articles that mention "lifetime risk", notably "Ovarian cancer" and "Breast cancer". Perhaps I should just create a stub article? Axl ¤ [Talk] 16:41, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

I'd rather see an article that's halfway between Risk and Lifetime risk. I don't think there's really all that much to say about lifetime risk (maybe a screenful?), but if we added in things {{Main}} summaries of pages like Relative risk and Risk of mortality, we might get a decent-sized article. What do you think? WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:20, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

It depends on the name that is given to the "new" article. It would need to be notable in its own right, and not just a mish-mash of different concepts. Axl ¤ [Talk] 09:51, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

Risk is about every form of quantifiable negative events, and the psychological aspects. It sounds like the medical side of risk is actually not very well covered at all (e.g. weighing the benefits of an interventional procedure against the risks of complications). Lifetime risk is an epidemiological concept that could either be discussed in context in the risk article or possibly as a subarticle.

Do we have a Wiki-epidemiologist kicking around somewhere? JFW | T@lk 10:04, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

I haven't run across anyone that seems to have a particular interest in epidemiology. Perhaps someone else has? WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:34, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

I asked at WikiProject Statistics. Axl ¤ [Talk] 12:18, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

Well folks, given the premises that:

(a) your loving, but hyphenophobic and rabid-personal-attack-prone friend Cliff (a/k/a Uploadvirus), DOES have his masters degree in epidemiology; PLUS

(b) I owe Axl several favors; AND

(c) I ABSOLUTELY MUST FIND A WAY to give JFW some proof that "paybacks are indeed "hell" (and that METASTASIS, and NOT INFECTION, is the leading cause of death in ; AND MOST IMPORTANTLY,

(d) I'm approximately (65% +/- 5%, p<0.0001) in Wiki-love with WhatamIDoing;

ERGO ...

is

(1) I'm willing to help with epi stuff IF, AND ONLY IF, JFW, the "Honcho-Doc" and kicker-arounder of folks who edit his lung cancer piece de resistance - gives me specific directions on what you guys want, AND

(2) we achieve consensus that we will band together to secertly give some cash to a "Truly Big Kahuna" who will ban Kwami, or Tony1, or other expert linguist, under penalty of death) from inserting ONE SINGLE SOLITARY PUNCTUATION MARK ANYWHERE.

Best regards: *smile*

Cliff Knickerbocker, M.S. ([[User talk:Uploadvirus|talk]]) (talk) 11:00, 18 June 2011 (UTC)

I can't agree to the last condition: Tony has helped me sort out a couple of grammar and punctuation problems. Experts are a useful thing to have around, even if we reject their advice on occasion (say, whenever they want to have a grammatically correct article title rather than the discipline-specific term).

As for exactly what we want: Do you have any sources that discuss lifetime risk as a concept? If so, we should defer to them. If not, then the things on my mind are these (and anyone should feel free to add to the list):

• How long is a "lifetime"? (I believe it varies.)
• How is "lifetime risk" supposed to be determined? I've seen one study that did a sort of "real world" lifetime risk, based on what people actually died from, but the breast cancer statistics (e.g., one in eight women will get breast cancer) are based on the unrealistic assumption that no woman dies before age 95 (yes, ninety-five, an age that only 5% of women achieve).
• How does it compare to incidence and prevalence?
• It might be useful to give some examples that compare the "lifetime risk of dying from..." to the "lifetime risk of having..." (the common cold, hypertension, etc.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:32, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

Editors adding links

We have three editors at least that are adding ELs. They are okay in nature but would be good to get them to improve article content instead. User: Peachnellba, User: KatArney, User:Sdanovi, and User:HenryScow. --Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 18:08, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

Comments? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 18:25, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

Proposed article: List of psychiatric medications by narcotic/non-narcotic categories

Hi, on #wikipedia-en-help there was an article suggestion for a list of medications by narcotic categorization. Is this something useful that editors would be interested in working on? Cheers, Ocaasi ^{t | c} 20:15, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

I started it here: List_of_psychiatric_medications_by_narcotic_class. It's very much a stub. Ocaasi ^{t | c} 20:35, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

What a strange request. It presumes that a lot of psychiatric medications are narcotics. Where is the evidence for that claim? JFW | T@lk 20:46, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

I'm struggling to think of a psychiatric medication that is a narcotic. Although I suppose it depends on how you define "psychiatric medication" and "narcotic".... Axl ¤ [Talk] 21:10, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

There are no "narcotics" used for the treatment of mental disorders, unless you consider buprenorphine, methadone et al. for management of opiate addiction. As drug regulation varies widely between countries, this would only really make sense in the context of the International Narcotics Control Board Yellow List, which does not contain a single "psychiatric medication" if memory serves. Fvasconcellos (t·c) 21:22, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

This was a hearty attempt by myself and macmed, but your suspicions are right and only 1/20 or so meds are narcotic. The hands-down winner was Xanax. But it's not enough for a list, alas. Ocaasi ^{t | c} 22:27, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

Autoimmune haemolytic anaemia

Hi, I've updated Autoimmune haemolytic anaemia from a stub. It says it's a "start" article (or "start page"?). I'm wondering if someone can check it and see if it should be updated from this because I'm not sure if it should or how to do it. Thanks! :) Hoganpc (talk) 16:13, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

I'll have a look. JFW | T@lk 20:19, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

The change in the first link of this diff in the talk page is how you do it. Directions are at WP:WikiProject Medicine/Assessment, and anyone is welcome to fix assessments for Stub, Start, C, and B classes. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:49, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

Great, thanks!Hoganpc (talk) 19:57, 18 June 2011 (UTC)

Medicine Good articles

If anyone is interested there are a few articles that were started by students on various medicine or biology related topics as part of a project. They were submitted for Good Article status, but due to the backlog are only just being reviewed now. If anyone is interested in Neurolaw, Hyperkinesia (neurology), Satellite glial cell, KC (patient), or the Cushing reflex and would be willing to address reviewers concerns could they please make themselves known at Wikipedia talk:Good article nominations. Many of them appear well sourced and quite broad so hopefully only slight touches will be needed to pass the articles. Thanks AIRcorn (talk) 06:25, 18 June 2011 (UTC)

A couple are only tangentially related but started on one. Thanks... Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 06:46, 18 June 2011 (UTC)

I've started the review at KC (patient), which is likely to fail because there are no editors at the article to deal with the handful of problems (the creation of a sufficient lead, for example). WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:22, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

(undent) By the way I have just nominated another important infectious disease syphilis for Good Article status. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:09, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

BMJ Editorial about WP:MED

Dear all,

The BMJ has published a favourable editorial on WP:MED, beginning with a citation of our JMIR article.

Editorial: WikiProject Medicine. Trevena L. BMJ 2011; 342:d3387.

This is really what we aimed for with the JMIR paper and I'm very pleased that we are gaining attention. Please keep on the look for new contributors that may be drawn here and give them a warm welcome and a helping hand, as usual.

cheers, Steven Fruitsmaak (Reply) 20:13, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

doi:10.1136/bmj.d3387 JFW | T@lk 23:51, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

heh, nice....Casliber (talk · contribs) 13:49, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Unfortunately the editorial lacks context a little bit. For one thing, it seems to suggest that the members of the WikiProject have written every entry. Furthermore, it is only a few paragraphs into the text that the reader understands that the WikiProject is part of Wikipedia rather than an independent effort. Is there anything we - as a WikiProject - ought to say in response? JFW | T@lk 18:19, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Can someone send me a full copy... Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 18:53, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

No medical journal access all the way up north, eh? ;) Check your email. NW (Talk) 19:02, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

At least it is positive even though there are many mistakes. The article confuses page views with monthly viewers And the bit that "Chinese contributions are non-existent"? Baidu has recently been found to be taking Wikipedia material and not acknowledging where it was from. But there is Chinese language topics. Also states "publishes exclusively under pseudonyms" Not all of use do. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 02:16, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Wrong and positive is a slight step above wrong and negative. --Guerillero | My Talk 03:01, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Agree :-) Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 04:01, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

It's kinda amazing to me that they don't, y'know, check the content or even facts with one of the many contributors on wikipedia, or WP:MED at the least... WLU (t) (c) Wikipedia's rules:^simple/_complex 14:18, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

I think someone ought to point out the mistakes if any. It's very easy to submit an online response on BMJ. Perhaps JFD or James Heilmann are best placed to reply. I personally was very happy, there were only a small details to correct and the general message was in line with our opinion piece; a call for doctors to contribute. --Steven Fruitsmaak (Reply) 09:44, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks have sent in a note to the author going over some corrections. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 04:35, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

A summary of the editorial is now at Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2011-06-20/In the news. Regards, HaeB (talk) 20:59, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

Source for obesity and bariatric articles

I'm sending an editor this way to discuss the suitability of a source for edits being added to two articles. This group is probably a better choice for evaluating the usefulness. Here's the discussion on my talk page, which includes links to his edits. The editor hasn't received much of a welcome, which is my fault; although I didn't revert the last edits, I did post this spam report. Thanks for your help. Flowanda | Talk 08:18, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes will watch. Inappropriate sources agree. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 04:44, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

Hi Doc James, Can you elaborate on the reasoning behind the inappropriate sources designation? As I mentioned in my discussion with Flowanda regarding the "Identifying Questionable Sources" page under "Questionable Sources", (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:RS#Questionable_sources) it states, "Questionable sources are those with a poor reputation for checking the facts, or with no editorial oversight." Bariatric Surgery Source easily passes these requirements, with extensive reference information provided at the bottom of each page and with complete editorial oversight of all pages by experienced industry professionals (again, the professionals responsible for each page are listed below each article's heading with a link to their profile). Many sites referenced throughout Wikipedia are commercial in nature (i.e. are "for-profit"), but as long as the content researched and presented is accurate, referenced and backed by credible industry professionals and as long as it contributes towards the "completeness" of each Wikipedia article, it seems that it should be include-able. For example, on one of the pages in question, Wikipedia has allowed Medscape to share information and reference their site as the source (http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/706394, reference #18). Medscape is also a for-profit "commercial" company (they are a part of the WebMD Health Network). Please help me understand the difference between their site and ours, other than their web site's traffic volume and company size. Thanks for your time. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jeffqu (talk • contribs) 16:32, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

We recommend strongly the use of review articles published in a reputable journal. This http://www.bariatric-surgery-source.com/fast-food-cause-obesity.html is not a review article. Some of the stuff on this page has overstated the evidence to put it mildly. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 18:09, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for your reply. So to make sure I understand, it's not the entire web site that is being excluded as a reference for Wikipedia, it's the chosen amendments applied thus far? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jeffqu (talk • contribs) 15:42, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

That website does not appear to be a reliable source for medical information. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:02, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

Can you help me understand your reasoning? It has an advisory council made up of bariatric professionals (licensed, practicing surgeons and dietitians) that write/review every page. It has also been HON Code certified, indicating the intention of providing transparent and reliable data. What would need to be changed/added/removed in order for that site to be considered reliable? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jeffqu (talk • contribs) 17:09, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

To be the highest quality class of source, it would need to become a peer reviewed medical journal or a textbook used by medical schools.

We are generally biased in favor of formal literature and against websites. Anybody can create a website. Even HONCode certification isn't difficult to get. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:08, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

I understand your concern about just anybody creating a website and referencing it. But our content has been written and reviewed by practicing bariatric professionals as indicated on our Advisory Council page: http://www.bariatric-surgery-source.com/your-bariatric-surgery-advisory-council.html . Have you reviewed the content on our site to confirm that all information is in fact presented in a very unbiased and complete manner? Does your response mean that our surgeons' knowledge and experience cannot contribute towards any part of the development of Wikipedia's knowledge base when holes in the content are found? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jeffqu (talk • contribs) 20:23, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

As you seem to be noting that this is "your" website, you should probably be sure to review our guideline on editing with a conflict of interest. From my standpoint, we should be using peer-reviewed material per WP:MEDRS and not websites. Certainly any surgeon can contribute to sources for Wikipedia the way other medical professional others do - by getting published in peer-reviewed literature. Yobol(talk) 20:32, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

If I re-publish the deleted contributions to the Bariatric Surgery page (percentage of excess weight lost data) and reference all of the peer-reviewed medical journals used to come up with that information instead of http://www.bariatric-surgery-source.com/, would that be allowable?

Material sourced to WP:MEDRS compliant sources (peer reviewed secondary literature such as medical reviews) would be reliable where a website would not. Yobol (talk) 23:10, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

But wouldn't that be considered a form plagiarism (or "gray area" at best)? I found the information on Bariatric Surgery Source's web site and became aware of the peer-reviewed journal articles from their page's reference section. The surgeons at Bariatric Surgery Source (all of which have been published in peer-reviewed journals, by the way) obviously took time on Bariatric Surgery Source's dollar to research, compile and disseminate the information in a unique way. Since the information is not brought together in that way on any other site, wouldn't re-publishing it on Wikipedia without referencing Bariatric Surgery Source be a form of plagiarism? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jeffqu (talk • contribs) 23:26, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

Republishing material that is not found in the medical literature in that form could be a form of original research, which is not allowed under our rules (without seeing the sources and the final material, I wouldn't be able to say for sure). That is why we rely on secondary medical reviews, which synthesizes the medical literature for us. Instead of relying on that website as a source, it might be a better use of your time to look for medical reviews in the literature in order to improve the article. Yobol (talk) 23:30, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

You must WP:SAYWHEREYOUGOTIT, but you do not need to say where you got the idea to go look up a particular publication. If you actually read a peer-reviewed paper, and take information out of it, you do not need to tell us which website/other publication/librarian/friend/physician gave you the idea to go read that paper.

NB that we prefer secondary sources like meta-analyses and reviews to case studies or original experimental reports. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:42, 23 June 2011 (UTC)

Doctor's visit

I've just run across the article Doctor's visit, split off from Doctor—patient relationship. It seems like the sort of subject that we might accidentally end up with multiple pages on. Is anyone aware of any others? Is there a better name for this subject? WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:09, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

A "medical consultation"? "Consultation (doctor)" is red-linked at "Consultation". Axl ¤ [Talk] 21:05, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

I'd move it to "Patient encounter", so it can be expanded and improved in future to cover settings where physicians and patients interact other than the usual "doctor's visit". Fvasconcellos (t·c) 17:14, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

I have never heard the term "patient encounter" before. However a quick Google search shows that it is commonly used. (I live and work in the UK, in case that's relevant.) Axl ¤ [Talk] 08:32, 18 June 2011 (UTC)

I've heard "patient encounter" before, but it seems formal to the point of being artificial, and it definitely expresses the professional point of view. People will say, "I've got a doctor's appointment on Tuesday," but never "I've scheduled a patient encounter for Tuesday".

Axl, does "consultation" imply that you're seeing a consultant? WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:35, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

No, could be any grade of doctor. It usually refers to an out-patient clinic appointment, not in-patient assessment. Axl ¤ [Talk] 21:29, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

Here is the first Google hit. Axl ¤ [Talk] 21:32, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

OB/GYN standard textbooks and Major medical dictionaries

Hello all. There a bit of a brouhaha at Talk:Abortion, and this request is somewhat related to that (sorry).

I am interested to know what books are considered the cream of the crop in OB/GYN. My understanding was that it was Williams Obstetrics and Gabbe's Obstetrics for obstetrics, but I couldn't exactly determine what it was for gynecology—Te Linde's Operative Gynecology? Is there anything else? In addition, are there are medical dictionaries besides Taber's, Stedman's or Dorland's that are very widely used by the medical community or by OB/GYNs in particular? Thanks, NW (Talk) 13:48, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

I can't speak to quality, but Blaustein's Pathology of the Female Genital Tract and Williams Gynecology sell slightly better at Amazon.com, and might be worth considering in your list. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:15, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

IMHO Williams’ is pretty much "the" textbook. If you're looking for the cream of the crop, look no further. I have had the pleasure of translating several OB/GYN textbooks and Williams’ is still my go-to reference. Fvasconcellos (t·c) 11:49, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

But which book? The older Williams Obstetrics, or the newer Williams Gynecology? WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:37, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

I have the 22nd edition of Obstetrics and the 2008 Gynecology (I think it's the only edition so far). I meant Obstetrics when I answered, though. Just realized NW was looking for the opposite (GYN, not OB). I stand by my recommendation, though—Gynecology is excellent and I have used it as a reference as well. Fvasconcellos (t·c) 18:19, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks! Is there anything else you would recommend? NW (Talk) 20:46, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

Beckmann's Obstetrics and Gynecology can be a pretty good source depending on your purpose. It is concise, ACOG-supported and its target audience is not OB/GYNs or OB/GYNs in training, but rather medical students doing their OB/GYN rotations, so it's sort of the physician's equivalent of a lay-oriented book, if that makes any sense.

As for dictionaries, you should be covered. Fvasconcellos (t·c) 20:58, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

Excellent, thank you. NW (Talk) 22:30, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

Polycystic kidney disease

Hello all - I've just been looking at the articles on polycystic kidney disease, ADPKD and ARPKD. It seems to me that there is a lot of duplicated content/confusion in these articles. The plain old PKD article seems to get the majority of the hits, but it lumps together info on ADPKD and ARPKD and, to my eye, doesn't really make clear enough that these are different diseases. Also, it only has a few references. The ADPKD and ARPKD pages seem to make this distinction more clearly and already have a number of references and work put into them.

It seems to me that the (AD/AR)PKD articles need to be reorganized/disambiguated...perhaps with a brief polycystic kidney disease article stating that this is an umbrella term for several diseases and then with links to the more specific diseases. Any thoughts/opinions on this?

Wawot1 (talk) 16:51, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

Agreed. These two conditions have very little in common except for the name, and have distinct and clearly defined pathophysiology and prognosis. The umbrella article should be kept as brief as possible, and direct readers to the pages on the specific conditions. --Arcadian (talk) 16:41, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

It sounds like we need a WP:DABCONCEPT page. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:44, 23 June 2011 (UTC)

New OMIM site

I had put in this request at Template talk:Infobox disease some time ago, but have received no response as of yet, so I am going to re-post it here to attempt to generate discussion (and hopefully action):

While NCBI still hosts OMIM files, the official OMIM database has shifted to a new site: [27]. Would it be possible to change the infobox linking to reflect this change? ~~ Lothar von Richthofen (talk) 15:33, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

Dengue fever at FAC

Hello all, just dropping a note to inform everyone that James and me have nominated dengue fever for FAC (FAC page). This is the culmination of a few months' work (and a lot of reprints!), and an important topic in international health. It would be great if everyone could have a look and advise on any improvements. JFW | T@lk 06:57, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

Hope you don't mind, I've added an image to the Research section (feel free to drop it or move it around). I'll have a look at the article later—seems great at first sight. Fvasconcellos (t·c) 12:11, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the image! When reading the WHO guideline I wasn't sure whether using fish as vector control was really being done in practice - this confirms it! JFW | T@lk 18:42, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, there are all kinds of vector control efforts underway in Brazil. During outbreaks, the most common is probably still space-spraying (for which there is no real evidence AFAIK), from trucks referred to jokingly as "fumacês" ("smokeys"), as well as social mobilization for cleanup of standing water, etc. Fvasconcellos (t·c) 19:10, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

More comments from this WikiProject still very much appreciated. This is a topic of fairly major worldwide relevance. JFW | T@lk 21:19, 23 June 2011 (UTC)

Breast mouse = fibroadenoma?

Would like some opinions on this. I was not familiar with this "name" although apparently it is commonplace somewhere and even has a certain explanatory power. Do not feel quite comfortable to leave it in the definition. Richiez (talk) 16:14, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

Hmmm. When I Googled "breast mouse", I got back a lot of pages marketing interestingly shaped computer peripherals. So I guess I learned something. I can accept that this alternate terminology has some currency, but it probably doesn't belong in the lead sentence of a serious encyclopedia. Perhaps somewhere in the body of the article. Do we have a "fibroadenomata in popular culture" section yet? :| MastCell ^Talk 16:29, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

It is not just popular culture, see http://www.breastspecialist.co.uk/otherbreastlumps.html Richiez (talk) 17:05, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

Breast mouse is a standard term in gynaecology for a fibroadenoma yes. I recall being taught that at medical school. Casliber (talk · contribs) 20:53, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

Probably a Commonwealth vs. U.S. difference then? If so, it's certainly worth mentioning in the article. (I wasn't familiar with the term FWIW.) Fvasconcellos (t·c) 21:00, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

Yep, Google shows mentions in BBC features and by the National Breast and Ovarian Cancer Centre of Australia, so I imagine it is pretty widespread usage in the UK and its former colonies ;) Fvasconcellos (t·c) 21:02, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

We use the term routinely up here in the north. --Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 21:50, 23 June 2011 (UTC)

OK... in that case it should be fine for the lead. I learned something. :) MastCell ^Talk 18:54, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

Have added a better ref. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:57, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

Drug infobox

We have recently arranged the drug info box and added links to display pages from The American Society of Health-System Pharmacists and MedlinePlus (similar to how we use eMedicine and MedlinePlus is the disease infobox). Does anyone have concerns with trying to create a bot that adds these two links to the drug infobox? Discussion regarding a bot is taking place here [28] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 20:28, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Cure for diabetes

Not sure where to put it actually (see also Talk:Diabetes mellitus), so I post it here as well: A recent study from Newcastle University, published in Diabetologia, suggests that type 2 diabetes is not chronic and can indeed be cured: Newcastle University article and study published in the journal. No idea how to work that into all the articles around diabetes. --Amazeroth (talk) 09:15, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

Well, reversal (or "cure") of type 2 diabetes has been described for ages—most recently, and with the best evidence, after bariatric surgery. This study certainly has worthwhile information that can and should be worked into our articles, but its findings are not the magical breakthrough portrayed by the media; the remarkable discovery here is how the reversal was brought about, not the reversal itself. Fvasconcellos (t·c) 13:07, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

That's true. Though if a somewhat simple diet indeed does have the same effects as invasive surgery (with frequent complications), it should be worked in. I admit to be a layman in medicine, but I don't consider that kind of surgery a real "cure". --Amazeroth (talk) 19:13, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

Well, you're not entirely mistaken: that's why most medical professionals would speak of "reversal", not "cure" (which is a very loaded word). This may not be a cure at all either—its merits notwithstanding, this was a very small study with no long-term follow-up. That's why we shouldn't, and musn't, hurry to incorporate this sort of highly publicized research into WP. Fvasconcellos (t·c) 06:33, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

It needs to be cited in a WP:MEDRS-compatible high-quality review before we can legitimately include it. The DPP already showed benefits of lifestyle modification, and the 2008 bariatric trials showed that DM2 can be cured. Let's not go along with the hype generated by the popular press. Every GP in the country already tells (or should be telling) their newly diagnosed diabetics that the disease can be reversed by weight loss. JFW | T@lk 13:28, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

As if I didn't know that. Did you actually take a look at the link provided? This is a peer-reviewed mecidal journal, and seems to be the leading medical journal on diabetes in Europe. --Amazeroth (talk) 19:13, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

I have underlined the key word in JFW's comment. I'm sure that you know the difference between a review article and a report of a single experiment with n=11, so you must have overlooked it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:47, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

Commons deletion discussion and general issues of consent for patient images

Editors here may have an informed opinion they would supply at Commons:Deletion requests/File:Human fetus 10 weeks - therapeutic abortion.jpg. Don't worry, it isn't an abortion discussion, more the question of patient consent.

I'm also working on improving the essay at Commons:Patient images. I've mainly been documenting professional guidelines in the "Medical practice" section. Anyone willing to help me work on this essay some more, potentially with a view to influencing Commons guidelines (which are lacking on anything other than copyright)? Colin°^Talk 14:47, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

Premature atrial contraction

Could somebody who's experienced in the cardiology field please have a look over this article? It needs a few links/sources, particularly in the 'causes' section --Berrie (talk) 06:43, 27 June 2011 (UTC) (please forgive me if I've made any errors, my editing skills are also a work in progress)

Welcome, Berrie.

It doesn't look like we've gotten any response. Does someone have five minutes to at least look over Premature atrial contraction? WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:19, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Well, I can't say I've added many sources, but unfortunately the article contained a fair bit of incorrect info which I've tried to correct. For example, PACs typically don't originate in the sinoatrial node, but rather from ectopic atrial foci. And they're not always followed by a QRS; if they're premature enough, they're typically blocked at the AV node during its refractory period. Anyhow, it definitely needs work and more sources, so I'll try to come back to it. As far as causes, PACs are more common in patients with structural heart disease, but they also occur occasionally, as an entirely normal and benign finding, in healthy people without heart disease. If you look hard enough, you'll find them in pretty much anyone. MastCell ^Talk 04:10, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

External links on eye condition pages

Hello all, I’ve been advised by Doc James to seek your advice/consensus on an issue.

I’d like to add external links from some Wikipedia eye condition pages to the eye condition pages on the RNIB website (Royal National Institute of Blind People). This is a large UK charity which is well regarded and a reliable source of info. Their eye condition pages are written in collaboration with the Royal College of Ophthalmologists (A professional body in the UK).

Having looked through WP:ELNO I understand the concern of avoiding “spammy” links, but I genuinely think those RNIB pages are useful sources of independent info, with a more human/patient focus than most of the Wikipedia info, which tends to be very science/medical research based.

The RNIB pages cover the information in a different way, or go in to more background details (such as how the eye works) so I don’t believe it is something that could be added to the article itself, rather I think it is useful further reading that should be linked to.

The same could be said of the links to the National Eye Institute website which is linked to from most Wikipedia eye condition pages, but RNIB gives a different angle as it is UK rather than U.S focused.

For a specific example, the glaucoma page could benefit from a link to the RNIB Glaucoma page.

It would be great to get your opinions on this, thanks. Kat384 (talk) 16:16, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

In general, the things we're looking for in external links are things we'd like to put in the article but can't, such as copyrighted material that can't be distilled into quotes and information (typically official or historical documents). Other desirable external links include databases of statistics, images, and other things where the info can't be realistically added to a readable article. We should probably re-evaluate why the NEI links are present if they have similar content, it's possible that they shouldn't be there either. It sounds like the RNIB content is general reference material on eye conditions, which is redundant from what our article should contain. That Wikipedia's content is science/medicine/research-based is just a bias of what editors have been involved in the article, it's not an intentional limitation of content, though things like individual patient stories are probably something we wouldn't include. SDY (talk) 19:50, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

If you find issues with readability feel free to improve them. Will we wish our articles to be understandable by the general public they should still be referenced to review articles. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 20:04, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

Definition of pneumonia

People seem to use all sorts of definition for pneumonia. Anyone able to help with ours. Some people use the term broadly some (the majority) limit it to only infectious causes using pneumonitis for inflammatory conditions.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:06, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

In the very best sources, "pneumonia" is overwhelmingly used to mean "lung infection" (except when referring to noninfections conditions that have come to be called pneumonia by use, such as lipoid pneumonia or organizing pneumonia). This is also the general meaning of "pneumonia" in public health. I imagine our article should reflect this.

If you're working on the Pneumonia article, some nice straightforward reviews were published in BMJ and American Family Physician in 2005/2006 that can probably still be useful. There was also a comprehensive review of viral pneumonias in The Lancet in early April. Fvasconcellos (t·c) 04:35, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes thanks. Agree it is almost always used to mean infection but sometimes is used to mean non infectious causes. I have done my best to reflect this. Added the Lancet Viral Pneumonia paper. The AFP article deals with CAP not pneumonia in general as do most papers. And we do have Idiopathic interstitial pneumonia Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 05:18, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Unqualified, the term "pneumonia" is used to mean "infectious pneumonia". Non-infectious pneumonias must have an appropriate qualifier to distinguish them. (By the way, the diagnosis "organizing pneumonia" is outdated. The histological finding is always interpreted in the context of the clinical features—and this usually should be called "cryptogenic organizing pneumonia".) Axl ¤ [Talk] 21:41, 1 July 2011 (UTC)

Respiratory disease article

I somehow stumbled upon the Respiratory disease article, and I do not exaggerate when I say I was HORRIFIED. I did a tiny bit of cleanup, and intend to work on it more when I have more time, but it is in terrible shape. Just thought I'd let you all know. Have a good day. Cliff Knickerbocker, M.S. ([[User talk:Uploadvirus|talk]]) (talk) 12:35, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes agree completely. May be it should be merged in to respiratory system? This is just a bunch of diseases. Or could be better as a list like List of cutaneous conditions Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 12:39, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

It seems Tyrol5 (talk · contribs) has an interest in this, so it might make sense to alert them to the existence of this article also. JFW | T@lk 12:46, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Done - left a note on his Talk Page.

Cliff Knickerbocker, M.S. ([[User talk:Uploadvirus|talk]]) (talk) 16:50, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

I'd personally like to see the article rewritten as a list; it certainly has potential, as it is a major class of disease. If consensus is reached that we'll write a list, I'd be more than happy to help out. Tyrol5 [Talk] 17:08, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

I like the list idea. List of cutaneous conditions is an excellent model. WhatamIdoing (talk) 14:17, 1 July 2011 (UTC)

There's a lot more to say about respiratory diseases than could comfortably fit in respiratory system, and the relationships among these conditions are too complex to be presented in a list. --Arcadian (talk) 16:37, 1 July 2011 (UTC)

Personally, I think I prefer WaId's suggestion that we use List of cutaneous conditions as a model for a similar "List of respiratory diseases". That page would have links to the (in-depth) articles on the individual diseases. Just let me know what you all want to do and I will pitch in.

Cliff (a/k/a "Uploadvirus") (talk) 20:58, 1 July 2011 (UTC) (finally fixed that idiotic looking sig of mine - sorry folks)

I oppose merging into "Respiratory system". The latter already enough info in it to justify itself without the addition of disease info. And there is enough disease info for the diseases to have their own article. I agree that "Respiratory disease" requires clean-up, and may be better as a list. Axl ¤ [Talk] 21:46, 1 July 2011 (UTC)

Here's a decent starting point, folks => [[29]]. Oh - and since SOMEONE has to take on the masochistic chore of doing the "neoplasms" section, I'll guess I will suck it up and "take one for the team" <:-p (also note: I redacted my earlier (stupid) "pro-merge" comment ...)

Cliff (a/k/a "Uploadvirus") (talk) 01:37, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

Pseudoscience

Longwinding discussion.

The source is precisly about pseudoscience but editors continue to suggest the source is not published or it is an issue that the source is not a systemtic review. Editors seem to have a personal disagreement with the mainstream source. The serious matters that are a threat to public health are: "The ‘Keep libel laws out of science’ campaign was launched on 4 June 2009, in the UK. Simon Singh, a science writer who alerted the public about the lack of evidence supporting chiropractic treatments, was sued for libel by the British Chiropractic Association (Sense about Science, 2009). Similar examples can be found in almost any country. In Spain, another science writer, Luis Alfonso Ga´mez, was also sued after he alerted the public on the lack of evidence supporting the claims of a popular pseudoscientist (Ga´mez, 2007). In the USA, 54% of the population believes in psychic healing and 36% believe in telepathy (Newport & Strausberg, 2001). In Europe, the statistics are not too different. According to the Special Eurobarometer on Science and Technology (European Commission, 2005), and just to mention a few examples, a high percentage of Europeans consider homeopathy (34%) and horoscopes (13%) to be good science. Moreover, ‘the past decade has witnessed acceleration both in consumer interest in and use of CAM (complementary and alternative medicine) practices and/or products. Surveys indicate that those with the most serious and debilitating medical conditions, such as cancer, chronic pain, and HIV, tend to be the most frequent users of the CAM practices’ (White House Commission on Complementary and Alternative Medicine Policy, 2002, p. 15). Elements of the latest USA presidential campaign have also been frequently cited as examples of how superstitious beliefs of all types are still happily alive and promoted in our Western societies (e.g., Katz, 2008). On another, quite dramatic example, Science Magazine recently alerted about the increase in ‘stem cell tourism’, which consists of travelling to another country in the hope of finding a stem cell-based treatment for a disease when such a treatment has not yet been approved in one’s own country (Kiatpongsan & Sipp, 2009). This being the current state of affairs it is not easy to counteract the power and credibility of pseudoscience." The threat to public health is a statement made as a conclusion rather than an assumption. This is indeed about the topic pseudoscience according to the source. For example, "This being the current state of affairs it is not easy to counteract the power and credibility of pseudoscience." One of the main pseudoscience points from full text is: "As preoccupied and active as many governmental and sceptical organizations are in their fight against pseudoscience, quackery, superstitions and related problems, their efforts in making the public understand the scientific facts required to make good and informed decisions are not always as effective as they should be. Pseudoscience can be defined as any belief or practice that pretends to be scientific but lacks supporting evidence. Quackery is a particular type of pseudoscience that refers to medical treatments. Superstitions are irrational beliefs that normally involve cause–effect relations that are not real, as those found in pseudoscience and quackery. These are a serious matter of public health and educational policy in which many variables are involved." The authors summarised the public health issue in the abstract. According to the source pseudoscience is a serious matter that threatens public health. It is OR if we don't summarise the main pseudoscience points because it would be taking the source out of context. From abstract: "Pseudoscience, superstitions, and quackery are serious problems that threaten public health and in which many variables are involved." Matute H, Yarritu I, Vadillo MA (2010). "Illusions of causality at the heart of pseudoscience". Br J Psychol. doi:10.1348/000712610X532210. PMID 21092400.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) The WP:V compliant source must be restored and sumarised at Pseudoscience. The Matute peer-reviewed source does not need to be a MEDRS qualifying review of pseudoscience literature. The text meets WP:SOURCES. It would be a violation of NPOV to imply a serious dispute where there is none. The text does not need to be attributed becuase editors disgree with researchers.

I think that a summary of Matutue et al. will contribute a lot to Pseudoscience#Demographics, Pseudoscience#Psychological explanations and Pseudoscience#Health and education implications.

For example, the following text will work well at Pseudoscience#Health and education implications as a starting point. --> Pseudoscience, superstitions, and quackery are serious matters that are a threat to [[public health]].<ref name=Matute>{{cite journal |journal=Br J Psychol |year=2010 |volume= |issue= |pages= |title= Illusions of causality at the heart of pseudoscience |author= Matute H, Yarritu I, Vadillo MA |doi=10.1348/000712610X532210 |pmid=21092400 |url=http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1348/000712610X532210/abstract }}</ref> Every time the high-quality source was restored it was quickly deleted in a matter of hours against Wikipedia's policy. QuackGuru (talk) 17:20, 4 July 2011 (UTC)

You say above that "The WP:V compliant source must be restored and sumarised at Pseudoscience."

As a point of fact, it is not sufficient for a source to be WP:V-compliant. There are thousands of WP:V-compliant sources on the subject. It is actually impossible to include every singe WP:V-compliant source in this article. Complying with WP:V tells you whether you may include the source. It does not tell you that you must include the source. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:48, 4 July 2011 (UTC)

Seriously ??

• Neuro immune dysfunction syndrome. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:15, 4 July 2011 (UTC)

I assume you're posting this because the page is blank. If you care so much, and if it satisfies WP:N, start writing it yourself. -FunkyDuffy (talk) 04:35, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

Actually, a notice on that page says it was deleted earlier today. I'm guessing SandyGeorgia found it to be a particularly poor article (the point being made moot by the deletion). Yobol (talk) 04:36, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

It was speedied, as it was a recreation of an article that had been deleted after AFD. JFW | T@lk 05:16, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

Sonopuncture

A while back, I asked on the talk page for Sonopuncture whether it might be wise to merge the article into acupuncture, since the article consists of nothing more than the few sentences in the "Closely related practices" section of the article. I thought this Wikiproject would probably be a good place to ask for opinions though. Thanks!--Yaksar (let's chat) 20:29, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

Running an h-index check

Can someone do the calculations for the h-index of Bernard Lewinsky? I don't know how to run the algorithm myself, but it is essentially the critical tipping point for the AfD. Silverseren^C 21:04, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

If someone's h-index is the tipping point for an AfD, then there's something horribly wrong with that AfD. MastCell ^Talk 21:43, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

Everyone is focusing on the relation to Monica Lewinsky and saying that he doesn't obtain any notability from her so it should be delete, but at the same time, not considering his own notability as a leading breast cancer researcher on his own. Silverseren^C 21:48, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

But can someone please run an h-index check for me, pretty please? Silverseren^C 22:09, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

What MastCell said. But since you asked so nicely, I have done so and described the process on the talk page of the AFD. I'm a layman, so my process might be wrong, but I believe it is correct. NW (Talk) 22:30, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

Just a quick note here: as someone participating in said AfD on the opposite side from that of Silver, let me just say that I do not think this issue is "essentially the critical tipping point for the AfD." Those arguing for keeping claim the person in question is a notable researcher, and the main point raised in favor of that view has been references to a supposedly high h-index. So it would be more accurate to say that the main argument in favor of keeping the article hinges on the h-index calculation, not the entire AfD. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 23:44, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

Fellow notability requirements

Does being a Fellow of the American College of Radiology falls under #3 of the notability requirements under WP:ACADEMIC? Silverseren^C 03:55, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

According to the the ACR website and their description of Fellows, approximately 10% of members are given the distinction of Fellow - I would find it hard to believe that 10% of radiologists in this country (or even 10% of ACR members, though I suspect most radiologists are members) are notable for Wikipedia by that distinction alone. Yobol (talk) 04:06, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

That section states that, in addition to the normal requirements of Fellowship that most societies have, they require that you have made a substantial contribution to radiology as well, which is why "individuals typically apply and are recognized much later in their careers." So, essentially, they're even more restrictive than most Fellowship societies, so I don't really understand your argument. Not to mention "Because only the ACR, no other major radiology associations such as ARRS, ASTRO, or RSNA, confers fellowship, the award is considered a mark of distinction in diagnostic radiology, radiation oncology, nuclear medicine, and medical physics." Thus, it seems to be the go to fulfillment of #3. Silverseren^C 04:13, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

I read that they say they are more restrictive than others, but the fact remains 1 out of 10 members of ACR is a "Fellow"; if, as I suspect, ACR is the "main" professional society of the specialty, the vast majority of radiologists will be a member. I personally can't imagine being in the "top" 10% of all radiologists in the country is a distinction that merits an article on Wikipedia by itself. I may be persuaded otherwise if ACR has a particularly stringent membership criteria, where being 10% of that membership group really means something. As a comparison, since IEEE standards are used in the WP:ACADEMIC, IEEE statistics show that less than 2% of IEEE members are fellows (they are 5 times more restrictive). Yobol (talk) 04:31, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

Except you're missing one important fact. The American College of Radiology is made up of 34,000 members. Thus, their 10% of Fellows make up 3,400. In comparison, the IEEE is made up of 400,000 members. Thus, because of their higher amount of people, they have to be more restrictive, down to 2%. This means that they have 8,000 Fellows, more than twice as many as in radiology. The reason why the ACR has such a higher percentage is because they still have just as many people that do important accomplishments as in other fields, but they have less members than other fields, so their percentage rate will be higher. But their amount of Fellows overall as a number is far less, but still comparable I would think to other major Fellow groups. The ACR is just as restrictive, if not more so, but a higher number of their members meet those restrictions. Along with them being a lower amount of people overall, this creates a higher percentage, but this is not indicative of not being restrictive. Silverseren^C 04:46, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

I read the comment above several times, but I just don't follow the logic of how 10% is "just as restrictive, if not more so" than 2%. The mind boggles. Maybe someone else could explain it to me. Yobol (talk) 04:56, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

Essentially, if you look at the statistics across the board for the number of Fellows from the major societies for the different majors, they all fall within about the same amount of Fellows for each society. Some may be half as much, like radiology, as others, because they have a smaller amount of members, but the numbers all even out. The Royal Society even meets this amount, at 8,000 Fellows. Overall though, regardless of the amount of members, they all have around the same number of Fellows. This is because, every year, they all nominate about the same amount of Fellows.

I suppose the easiest question to ask is, regardless of percentages, does the added requirement of having to make a substantial contribution in addition to the other requirements of time and letters and other things, not make the ACR requirements more difficult than the ones for the IEEE? If yes, then the percentages are irrelevant. Silverseren^C 05:15, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

To answer the second question, the answer would be no, as you can see if you looked at the requirements on the IEEE website. You seem to be making the explicit assumption that there should be roughly equal number of "Fellows" in each academic field, regardless of the size of the pool of applicants in each field (i.e. a large pool such as engineering vs. a relatively much smaller specialty of medicine such radiology) - an assumption I can find no real compelling logical basis for. Percentage as a rough guide for how stringent membership criteria is still seems a much better way of guiding us here. Yobol (talk) 06:01, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

The main issue I have is that, with that conclusion, 8,000 electrical engineers are now automatically notable under #3 of WP:ACADEMIC and no radiologists are at all. Silverseren^C 09:43, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

That's right, it's only being "a Fellow of a major scholarly society for which that is a highly selective honor" that automatically confers notability by our standards. I read that to imply no radiologists are automatically notable via criterion 3 of ACADEMIC. There are of course another 8 criteria there (as well as GNG), so it doesn't mean that no radiologist is notable, just that their notability is to be established by other criteria. --RexxS (talk) 10:13, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

I don't know, that just seems biased, IMO, towards electrical engineers. Considering that if the ACR was considered selective enough, it would only be 3,600 people under the criteria anyways. I would have just thought that the single major society in each separate field of study that offers a fellowship would fall under #3. That seems the easiest way to do it, because otherwise you're trying to determine exactly what amount is considered selective. And that just leads to opinionated bias. Silverseren^C 11:26, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

All the above seems to miss the basic point of wp:GNG. We only know that something or someone is notable if we can verify it with substantial publications about them in reliable sources. In other words, we'll know they are notable when someone credible takes published notice of them. That has absolutely nothing to do with how many fellows there are in a given college.LeadSongDog come howl! 15:14, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

You would think so, indeed. Unfortunately, editors are idle and always want short-cuts, so instead of using GNG, they want an alternative that saves them having to go search for sources to establish notability. ACADEMIC is just such a short-cut, and relies on the fact that in any field a small number of individuals are very likely to be notable via GNG if they meet other (easier to establish) criteria. In the case of criterion#3, it is presumed that those 2% of the membership of the IEEE who have been elected Fellows are very likely to meet GNG anyway, so it saves us having to look. The mistake is extrapolating that to say that 10% of members of ACR are very likely to meet GNG, just because the radiologists have elected them Fellows of the ACR. The analogy with the IEEE breaks down because the ACR is less selective. The criterion (which is a guideline, of course) clearly indicates that only societies that are highly selective with their Fellowships can be expected to be useful as a short-cut to bypass GNG. --RexxS (talk) 16:26, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

I think that caveat #3 is important: It's not good enough to meet the rule of thumb. We must have independent, third-party sources about the subject. It's entirely possible that these would be easier to find for the ACR fellows than for the IEEE fellows. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:20, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

• Well, then, WP:ACADEMIC needs to be rewritten, because it currently states that if you meet any of the criteria, you are notable, period. That would mean even without reliable sources. (Though the likelihood of there being no reliable sources if you meet the criteria is almost nil anyways, but still) Silverseren^C 20:21, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

• Err, no? "It is possible for an academic to be notable according to this standard, and yet not be an appropriate topic for coverage in Wikipedia because of a lack of reliable, independent sources on the subject." NW (Talk) 22:31, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

• Ah, I see. But doesn't that seem to be kidna messing up the concept of notability on Wikipedia? It's generally used that, if you're notable, then that's all that is necessary and that it is assumed that the sources exist somewhere. Silverseren^C 22:36, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

That's exactly backwards, unfortunately. For an article to be a suitable subject for Wikipedia, it has to have reliable sources – otherwise there's nothing for us to write, so we should be finding the sources first. The next step is to ensure notability, and guidelines like ACADEMIC are there to help us decide whether searching for sources to establish notability is likely to be fruitful, but it's not a guarantee. That's why the third general note (after the 9 criteria) contains the caveat that a subject may be notable by ACADEMIC, but still not suitable for a Wikipedia article if sources are lacking. --RexxS (talk) 00:09, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

I agree that ACADEMIC explains this fact poorly. Perhaps someday we will improve it to more accurately and fully communicate the standards. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:48, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

Scope of WPMED

I have started a discussion here regarding what articles should be included in WP:MED. Wondering if more people can comment.--Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:06, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

Could you link to the discussion please? DigitalC (talk) 00:22, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

WT:MEDA#WP:MEDs_most_popular_pages. The question could be summarized as "Is Anal sex properly a medical article?" WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:03, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

OrangeMarlin

Readers here might be interested in this post from OM. [30] --Anthonyhcole (talk) 11:16, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

Interesting discussion on WP:RSN

A new discussion about the appropriateness of citing a source after only reading the abstract (and not the full article) was started on WP:RSN here. I'd be interested to see what others here feel about the subject. Yobol (talk) 17:22, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

Redirect Primary care to Health care?

I thought this diff[31] was bold and maybe useful but perhaps there would/should be objection to it. Jesanj (talk) 18:08, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

I suspect this is equally WP:BOLD: revert JFW | T@lk 18:15, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

Different fields of activity. Health care includes all aspects of running hospitals, ambulances, midwidfery provision, some aspects of social care for those with disabilities. Only one aspect of Health care is that provided by the narrower scope of Primary care. David Ruben ^Talk 16:06, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

I agree with David Ruben. NCurse _work 12:03, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

MEDRS complaint source

Editors at Chiropractic have claimed that Bronfort et. al does not meet WP:MEDRS, because it was sponsored by the UK General Chiropractic Council, ("The UK General Chiropractic Council provided the funding for this scientific evidence report.") and is therefore not independent of the topic. The authors state under the "competing interests" section that "All authors are trained as doctors of chiropractic but are now full time professional researchers" which to me would indicate that they are independent of the topic, and that this is not a reason for failing WP:MEDRS. I would appreciate some feedback on the issue, and since there is no WP:MEDRSN, hopefully this is an appropriate area to post this. DigitalC (talk) 00:22, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

WP:MEDRS does not to my knowledge make any opinion on the use of citations which have a potential conflict of interest. The decision to use a COI source comes down to WP:CONSENSUS in combination with other policies such as WP:NPOV and WP:WEIGHT. My personal opinion is that a blanket ban on using potentially biased or partisan sources is not helpful but equally if less biased/non-biased sources covering the same area are available they should generally be given preference or used instead. Is there a review of the same nature that can be used instead? Other editors here at WikiMED may have a different viewpoint and I am speaking as an individual by the way.--Literaturegeek | T@1k? 06:13, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

Agree that WP:MEDRS doesn't speak to the specific issue of funding status one way or another. I also believe that, in general, funding status should have little to no bearing on whether or not an article should be included, provided that it is published in an an objectively peer-reviewed journal, otherwise we open a can of worms no one wants to open. As to the specifics of this case, I do not know the general reputation of the authors or journal to give an informed comment, though a chiropractic funded study, authored by chiropractors, and published in a chiropractic journal, would certainly raise a red flag for me to study the issue a little closer. I also note that this particular review is being sourced in the lead, and upon quick perusal of the section it is supposed to summarize, it appears it may be given too much WP:WEIGHT (other reviews seem to disagree with it, raising another red flag as to why only this review is cited about effectiveness). Yobol (talk) 15:56, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

Reviews do disagree, and that is why we follow WP:NPOV. The article heavily relies on articles written by Edzard Ernst, a critic of chiropractic. Please feel free to study the issue a little closer, but to me, the issue that it is authored by chiropractic researchers (non-practicing, so no COI), and funded by a chiropractic organization isn't an issue, and I see those raising it as an issue as launching an ad-hominem attack. It is published in a peer-reviewed journal of high quality. Weight issues can be decided by consensus on the article talk page, it was more the COI/funding aspect that I wanted feedback on here, though feel free to participate further at the article talk page. DigitalC (talk) 16:19, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

Right, with reviews disagreeing, WP:WEIGHT would suggest that this disagreement would actually be present in the lead (i.e. there would be some non-zero indication in the lead that there is disagreement rather than just the presentation of one side by one disputed review). I don't plan on doing much editing in this area, as I have other priorities and articles I've been planning on updating/editing for months. However, if the lead is any indication of what the quality of the article is like, I might have to add it to m to-do-list. Yobol (talk) 17:29, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:MEDRS#Use independent sources:

"Many medical claims lack reliable research about the efficacy and safety of proposed treatments or about the legitimacy of statements made by proponents. In such cases, reliable sources may be difficult to find while unreliable sources are readily available. Whenever writing about medical claims not supported by mainstream research, it is vital that third-party, independent sources be used. Sources written and reviewed by the advocates of such marginal ideas can be used to describe personal opinions, but extreme care should be taken when using such sources lest the more controversial aspects of their opinions be taken at face value or, worse, asserted as fact. If the independent sources discussing a medical subject are of low quality, then it is likely that the subject itself is not notable enough to have its own article or relevant enough to be mentioned in other articles."

"Whenever writing about medical claims not supported by mainstream research, it is vital that third-party, independent sources be used." according to Wikipedia:MEDRS#Use independent sources. There seems to be some confusion. The source is a report not a traditional review. "The UK General Chiropractic Council provided the funding for this scientific evidence report." A UK chiropractic report sponsored by the UK General Chiropractic Council is a low-quality source. See WP:WEIGHT.

See WP:MEDASSESS:

"Knowing the quality of the evidence helps editors distinguish between minority and majority viewpoints, determine due weight, and identify information that will be accepted as evidence-based medicine. In general, editors should rely upon high-quality evidence, such as systematic reviews, rather than lower-quality evidence, such as case reports, or non-evidence, (e.g., anecdotes or conventional wisdom).

The best evidence comes from meta-analyses of randomised controlled trials (RCTs), and from systematic reviews of bodies of literature of overall good quality and consistency addressing the specific recommendation. Narrative reviews can help establish the context of evidence quality. Roughly in descending order of quality, lower-quality evidence in medical research comes from individual RCTs, other controlled studies, quasi-experimental studies, and non-experimental studies such as comparative, correlation, and case control studies. Although expert committee reports or opinions, along with clinical experience of respected authorities, are weaker evidence than the scientific studies themselves, they often provide helpful overviews of evidence quality. Case reports, whether in the popular press or a peer-reviewed medical journal, are a form of anecdote and generally fall below the minimum requirements of reliable medical sources."

"Narrative reviews can help establish the context of evidence quality." according to WP:MEDASSESS. It is not our job to question the experts like Ernst. The Ernst 2008 source clearly meets MEDRS but the source was deleted from the lead again and replaced with a source funded, authored, and published by chiropractors.

"Table 3 gives an overview of the most up-to-date systematic reviews by indication.137e144 These systematic reviews usually include trials of spinal manipulation regardless of who administered it. Thus, they are not exclusively an evaluation of chiropractic. Collectively, their results fail to demonstrate that spinal manipulation is effective. The only possible exception is back pain. For this condition, manipulation may be as effective (or ineffective) as standard therapy.137" (Ernst 2008)

• "137. Assendelft WJJ, Morton SC, Yu Emily I, Suttorp MJ, Shekelle PG. Spinal manipulative therapy for low-backpain. The Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews 2004;(Issue 1)10.1002/14651858. Art No.: CD000447.pub2.
• 138. Gross AR, Hoving JL, Haines TA, et al. Manipulation and mobilisation for mechanical neck disorders (Cochrane Review). In: The Cochrane Library, Issue 1, 2004. Chichester, UK: John Wiley & Sons, Ltd, 2004.
• 139. Fernandez-de-Las-Penas C, Alonso-Blanco C, Cuadrado ML, et al. Are manual therapies effective in reducing pain from tension-type headache?: a systematic review. Clin J Pain 2006;22:278e285.
• 140. Ernst E. Chiropractic spinal manipulation for neck painda systematic review. J Pain 2003;4: 417e442.
• 141. Proctor ML, Hing W, Johnson TC, Murphy PA. Spinal manipulation for primary and secondary dysmenorrhoea. The Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews 2001;(Issue 4)10.1002/14651858. Art. No: CD002119.pub2.
• 142. Husereau D, Clifford T, Aker P, Leduc D, Mensinkai S. Spinal manipulation for infantile colic. Technology report no 42. Ottawa: Canadian Coordinating Office for Health Technology Assessment, 2003:ie36.
• 143. Balon JW, Mior SA. Chiropractic care in asthma and allergy. Ann Allergy Asthma Immunol 2004;93:S55eS60.
• 144. Reid SA, Rivett DA. Manuel therapy treatment of cervicogenic dizziness: a systematic review. Man Ther 2005;10:4e13."

The Ernst 2008 narrative review does summarise the effective section with regard to higher-quality systematic reviews. Ernst E (2008). "Chiropractic: a critical evaluation". J Pain Symptom Manage. 35 (5): 544–62. doi:10.1016/j.jpainsymman.2007.07.004. PMID 18280103. QuackGuru (talk) 21:45, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

More eyes needed on Chiropractic, if possible, please. There is a dispute over the removal of Ernst 2008] and its replacement with Bronfort et al 2010. The former is published in J Pain Symptom Manage while the latter is from Chiropractic & Manual Therapies. Personally, I think both views need to be mentioned, but there is a suggestion that Ernst 2008 is too old versus another suggestion that Bronfort 2010 fails MEDRS because it's not published in an independent journal. It really will need more opinions brought to the debate to forge an acceptable consensus. Thanks in advance for any help you can give. --RexxS (talk) 22:53, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

Please note, the discussion is over the removal of Bronfort et al 2010 and replacement with Ernst 2008. The use of Bronfort et al 2010 as a source in the LEAD had achieved consensus 6 months ago [32]. This was until 1 of 15 controversial changes [33], made on July 7-8 by one editor without any prior discussion on the articles talk page, removed Bronfort et al 2010 as a source and replaced it with Ernst 2008. Again, Bronfort et al 2010 was included in the lead according to consensus [34]. Now Bronfort has been removed from the LEAD and replaced with Ernst 2008 before consensus was reached to do so. Please See [35].Puhlaa (talk) 23:32, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

Absolute nonsense. The debate is about removing Ernst 2008 from the lead, which clearly had no consensus 6 months ago (per the discussion you indicated: Talk:Chiropractic/Archive 33#Changes needed in the LEAD and Talk:Chiropractic/Archive 33#Are we dropping the Ernst review too soon?), and has no consensus now. You were the only editor campaigning for it then and it is an insult to the intelligence of all the editors who participated to now suggest there is consensus for its removal. --RexxS (talk) 00:24, 10 July 2011 (UTC)

This diff [36] suggests that RexxS also supported the text in the article as it existed with Bronfort used as a source in the LEAD and Ernst only cited in the BODY. I suspect that the 1000 mass controversial changes [37], made by one editor, spread out over 15 edits on July 7-8, have confused other editors as to what was and what was not in the article before July 7. Furthermore, Talk:Chiropractic/Archive 33#Changes needed in the LEAD shows that there were also other editors that supported the changes made 6 months ago, including someone else usually critical of chiropractic (BRangifer). The chiropractic article has included only Bronfort in the LEAD since February after discussion and consensus (see 2 diffs I have provided above in this post). Now Bronfort has been removed and replaced with only Ernst? Ernst does not accurately summarize the body (see [38]), and there are no notable disagreements that need to be discussed in the LEAD. RexxS, please strike-out your accusations of my insulting other editors intelligence. Puhlaa (talk) 14:21, 10 July 2011 (UTC)

Sacroiliac joint dysfunction

• Sacroiliac joint dysfunction (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

This is a new article where I noticed a minor edit war. On talking with one of the participants, it is clear that help is needed to assess the state of the article and its references. There are suggestions that some text may be too close to one of the references (plagiarism), and that some references may be used inappropriately, and that a medical article contains misinformation. Please see Talk:Sacroiliac joint dysfunction for some more background. The two main editors (who disagree with each other) are both new and need guidance. Johnuniq (talk) 12:08, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

Edits to cardiology articles

Could someone take a look at the edits of User:Lbeben? I'm not sufficiently knowledgeable in this area to properly assess his contributions, but they set off alarm bells for me. mgiganteus1 (talk) 04:27, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Most of what he writes is original research based on a very advanced personal understanding of physiology. Repeated requests from Davidruben (talk · contribs) and myself over the years have not led to an improvement. I have repeatedly come within inches of blocking him for ignoring our requests. Are there any edits you are particularly concerned about? JFW | T@lk 06:59, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

On closer review of recent edits, I have decided to block him for 3 months. This has carried on long enough. I am prepared to unblock Leslie if he agrees to mentoring and a number of clear agreements with regards to sourcing. I am volunteering to mentor him, but if anyone else is interested please let me know. JFW | T@lk 07:17, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Redundant Categories

Category: Cardiac procedures and surgery and Category:Cardiac surgery appear to be mostly the same thing, should we merge them? FunkyDuffy (talk) 15:05, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Sounds like a good idea. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 03:59, 1 July 2011 (UTC)

Awesome, Ill nominate it for admin action. Update: Added to huge backlog, hopefully an admin can get on this soon. :( FunkyDuffy (talk) 14:30, 1 July 2011 (UTC)— Preceding unsigned comment added by FunkyDuffy (talk • contribs) 14:21, 1 July 2011 (UTC)

This was speedily implemented on 3 July, but meanwhile a parallel discussion was started at CFD 2011 July 2 and now alternatives have been proposed - please comment there. - Fayenatic (talk) 18:32, 4 July 2011 (UTC)

That discussion is now closed. All the re-categorised articles were about surgery anyway, except for Cellular cardiomyoplasty. - Fayenatic (talk) 19:20, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Offer to share images

Typical ECG abnormalities in Brugada syndrome: ST elevation in V1-V3, without ischemia.

Hey Guys. I have been in discussion with Dr. de Jong with respect to his sites http://www.cardionetworks.org , http://www.ecgpedia.org , http://www.echopedia.org , http://www.pcipedia.org . His group is interested in collaborating with use ( releasing their images under a license that we can use with appropriate attribution ). This is a great opportunity to increase our image coverage of some of these topics. Attribution will of course be attached to the image but what are peoples thoughts on attribution within the caption? Maybe a blue number link that brings people to ref section that than links to their page? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 23:46, 10 July 2011 (UTC)

WP:CREDITS (and a heck of a lot of discussion in the past, such as [39]) indicates that we shouldn't include image credits in the caption. If Dr. de Jong really wishes that we include credit in the caption as a condition for securing the release of the photographs though, I'm sure WP:IAR trumps the Manual of Style. And I think that if that is going too far, your reference link idea is a nice compromise. NW (Talk) 01:52, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

Yes I am still in discussions. He received approval from his board to work on a collaboration with us. I am thinking the little blue link as in my example is a fair compromise. I believe that it is important from our end to give some recognition to partner sites that are willing to work with us ( I BTW have a few others that have expressed interested but am still working on specifics ). Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 02:02, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

Per previous discussions and guidelines linked by NW, we can't make in-article attribution part of the licence conditions. Note that if you print (e.g. to PDF) an article, then the image attribution is included. Lots of people contribute to an article but none of them get their names on the main HTML page. Colin°^Talk 07:13, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

I often link to the source of the image when I add images from other sites such as the CDC as done in the example here as this gives a reference to the image for verification purposes (6 of the images on the obesity page have refs in the caption). Comments regarding this? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 14:11, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

If the caption text requires a reference then that's fine and quite routine. If the image is generated from information that needs to be sourced, the citation should be on image page (here or on Commons) so that the source of the data is available whereever the image is used. If the image is lifted from another source then that naturally gets mentioned in the image page. If the licence requires attribution then that too goes on the image page. I don't think these things should be on the article page at all. It seems like a nice generous idea but we can't treat some people differently to others. You'd really need to overturn the consensus at WP:CREDITS and I disagree that this is the sort of thing WP:IAR is for. Colin°^Talk 15:16, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

The Wikimedia projects as a whole are rich in content, but relatively poor in images. I think that initiatives to enrich our stock of usable images should be encouraged, even to the extend of "bending" guidelines like WP:CREDITS and I would support the discreet use of such an inline reference if that helped us to attract more quality media. Of course, the ideal solution would be to link to a wikipedia article about Jonas de Jong or his websites. Is there sufficient notability to justify that? --RexxS (talk) 14:50, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

There are all sorts of things we could do to improve the stock of photographs, but choose not to. For example, many people would contribute images if we could restrict them to be "for educational purposes only" or "for Wikipedia only". What happens if the image appears on the main page? Do we have to stick the photographer's name there too? Colin°^Talk 15:16, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

Offers like this are very seductive, but there are clearly some pitfalls that would have to be worked through. Would all the wikipedias be able to use the images, or just :en? Could they go on commons? Are the image technical formats suited? If not, are we licensed to convert them? Do we meet wp:Non-free images criteria? Do we need a separate NFI justification for each use, or will one blanket one serve? Is credit on the wp:Image description page sufficent? If not, would a credit in the form of a link to a WP article about the source website suffice? LeadSongDog come howl! 15:26, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

@Colin: I've had a little experience with Main Page recently, and I can assure you that the images/thumbnails there don't have captions, so the question would not arise. If I understand James correctly, there's no issue of applying restrictive terms, just the gesture of duplicating the source attribution (already available at the image page) within an article. This kind of 'compromise of our principles' seems a small price to pay. In any event, we would have to make clear to Dr de Jong that we could not guarantee that any in-article attribution would remain in place, since a consensus of editors at a given article could override any actions we may make.

@LSD: The only licence that meets James' description and our requirements is CC-BY-SA. In that case, the images would be fine for Commons or anywhere else, and derivative works would be allowed under the conditions of attribution. I wouldn't be interested in seeing images licensed under anything less. --RexxS (talk) 16:12, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

My understanding is that the CC-BY-SA attribution is considered to be met on wp by our link to the help:File page on commons, where the details are provided. Would this satisfy them? LeadSongDog come howl! 17:00, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

RexxS, the main page question was rhetorical, but highlights how unworkable an "alongside the image" attribution condition would be. The answer to the question: can we attribute the photographs on the article HTML page is simply no. One of our principles is fairness. No contributor, text, image or sound, is entitled to that sort of recognition. Colin°^Talk 17:07, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

Colin, with regards to your Main page comment, WP:POTD quite regularly gives image credits, both to the original creator of the image as well as the graphics editor. NW (Talk) 17:43, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

I have not hammered out the details with ECGPedia yet. I am just looking at different options. I think the one I proposed is fair. Yes there is a minimum that we are required to do to meet CC-BY-SA which is what the images would be released under. This does not however mean that we must do the minimum. We could do more. If we wish to get more groups to work with us a bit of a compromise would be useful. I want to be able to approach further people after this is done and say 1) we partnered with this group 2) they got more traffic from Wikipedia because they allowed usage of content under a CC-BY-SA license 3) thus you should also consider working with us. Would hopefully also publish a paper based on these partnerships. If we insist on always giving the minimum legally allowed credit my job will be harder.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 18:18, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

This really needs to be discussed at WP:CREDITS. And if you are linking to the source site in-article, then at WP:EL. Both guidelines would need to be overturned or altered to allow this.I really don't want to be so negative because more images would be great. But I'm very doubtful that the community would accept such a change. CC-BY-SA is fine, but the attribution is on the image page on the web and the bottom of the article when printed as PDF. This isn't really a WP:MED issue. Colin°^Talk 19:13, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

I really only edit this project and am only working on increasing medical images. Before I go elsewhere would like support from people here if they are willing to give it. As the obesity article shows we already provide links in many captions. These links would be used as references rather than WP:EL thus EL would not apply. Per the discussion here [40] at WP:CREDIT it is unclear if our advice is compliant with the law. This is more a issue of WP:V. We have concerns over at Commons frequently regarding whether or not the image source is reliable. This will give some assurance of that. Images should be dealt a little differently from text. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:16, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

The concept, where somebody gives WP something valuable, we mention them in an article and link to their website, and their website gets more visitors, sounds an awful lot like advertising. Wrt WP:V, any sourcing issues for the image should be dealt with on the image page, not the article page. Those sourcing issues are quite independent of where the image appears. So I'm still not convinced we can use WP:V as a rationale for including article attribution/links. Colin°^Talk 07:59, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

That is what we do every time we reference the NEJM or Lancet. We "advertise" for these journals. I do not see how this is any different. We are verifying the source of what we have here.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 15:00, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

We're not adding the link in return for some favour. And I've already said I've there's no problem with the image attribution/link being on the image page. Now, if the NEJM or the Lancet want to give Wikipedian's free subscriptions so we can all write better articles using their journals as sources, we could start talking about making cite journal template use a bigger bolder font and a click-through percentage for WP:MED members :-). Colin°^Talk 15:49, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

Not sure what you mean? What I am referring to is that whether an image was taken by a physician versus the lay public affects the reliability of the photo just as whether text content is support by a newpaper or the NEJM affects its reliability. Textbooks and journals give more apparent attribution than we at Wikipedia do. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 16:18, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

WRT the above image I will be referencing the cardiologists interpretation of the ECG for the caption. Thus will not be referencing the image but the caption text. So for this collaboration with ECGPedia and EchoPedia attribution in the caption will be a moot point.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 20:21, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Are we interested in collaborating with other sites?

I personally think collaborating with other sites is potentially good for all involved. We would be offering greater exposure, they would be offering high quality content / more editors / greater exposure. This is a form of Wikipedia:GLAM IMO but we are dealing with other sites / institutions. Is this something people here support me pursuing? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:42, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

Yes, of course. Wrt image donations, I'm sure there are people on WP and Commons with loads of experience dealing with folk wanting to donate images and negotiating license terms and what they get in return. If you read the WP Signpost back issues you'll find examples and probably talking to those people will be more useful to you than the WP:MED project, on those sort of issues. Colin°^Talk 08:03, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

I don't really have any interest in collaborating with other sites, mostly because it seems like they get far more benefit than we do from such assistance. I don't think that we want our content to depend on a willingness to spam links to other websites into our articles. If some other website offers us an image, for example, they ought to be named or linked at the File: page, but not in the article—just like any image uploaded by a regular editor. I'm not willing to accept WP:REFSPAM to get an image. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:20, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

I do not see how this if that different from referencing the NEJM. We state where we get ideas from. Why not state where we get images from? There have been questions regarding the reliability of images based on who took it. We should make this more clear. Medical texts and journal give even more credits than what I am suggesting.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:59, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

Because when we're citing the NEJM, we're normally citing facts from the NEJM, not specific words or images from it. "If you're not sure that the information in this sentence is correct, it can be verified at PMID 123" is not the same as "The folks at example.com were kind enough to give us this picture". WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:26, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

James, we do state where we get the image from. On the image page. I agree it is good to know this is a verified image of dengue rather than an amateur snap of what may be measles, say, but it benefits everyone to have that located with the image. There's no benefit to WP to moving or copying that attribution/verification onto the article page. This is a "if everyone were allowed to do that" problem.

I think WhatAmIDoing's point is that such collaboration needs to be on the same terms as we collaborate. All we get is a warm feeling inside from making information freely available (apart from the folk who are drug company shills and get paid, of course). Colin°^Talk 20:37, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

However Wikimedia Commons and Wikipedia are different sites. I know the lawyer says having attribution their is all that is required legally but I still think a little attribution for images on Wikipedia would improve Wikipedia not only with respect to increasing image donations but increasing reliability. Textbooks and journals give this sort of credit.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:39, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia gives image credit at the bottom of the page when "printed" as a PDF book. Textbooks may give image credit in some appendix rather than next to the image. Online resources rarely give image credit. In fact, clicking on the sites above that started this discussion, I'm finding it difficult to find any image credits. Images seem to link to a missing image page on Commons. Is their website broken? Colin°^Talk 21:02, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

I have emailed the site for clarification of this... Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 21:39, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Jonas states:

• Where personal acknowledgment is important (almost exclusively ECGs) images will have a 'courtesy of' notice on the image itself
• If there is no ecgpedia.org logo / text on the image, there is often a reason, such as an image from a third party with usage exclusively for ecgpedia (such as the Wilde rhythm puzzles), so it would be good to discuss these images before re-use.
• Images with an ECGpedia logo, but no 'courtesy of' are often made by myself or on my request (by e.g. a payed student / illustrator) and they can be used with acknowledgment to ecgpedia, without personal acknowledgement.

Thus it appears that almost all images are by the creator of the site. And the attribution he wishes is to ECGPedia. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 16:02, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

Edits to WikiProject Medicine articles

I wish to alert this project about the edits of a relatively new editor, Guptan99 (talk · contribs). Since Feb 23, 2011 this person has 1,624 edits [41] and all or most all pertain to aritcles in the medical ahd health fields. This person's most recent 500 edits are since May 26, 2011 [42]. On their talk page [43] is notification of at least one inappropriate merge. I have no idea what type of edits this person is doing, because this editing has just caught my attention while I am involved in discussions and activities on two other Wikiprojects right now. I thought, just in case, this project might wish to review this editors contributions. Also the editors here are more likely to have the expertise to make quicker assessments than I. ---- Steve Quinn (talk) 02:54, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

Look fairly good. Working in public health and medical admin topic areas. Will send him a welcome. Adding refs. What he writes makes sense. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 03:37, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

Vitamin D

Could someone please have a look at the recent edits to vitamin D and hypovitaminosis D. The new user Overagainst (talk · contribs) has made significant changes to both these articles, removing more than half the content of each. I think these dramatic changes warrant review from someone knowledgeable in this area. Thanks. Deli nk (talk) 12:34, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

In the name of all that is holy, this editor must be stopped! --FunkyDuffy (talk) 02:33, 16 July 2011 (UTC)

Other groups that are interested in working with us

• TRIP Database
• Maclean's column Science-ish

Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:42, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

TRIP Database

TRIP database as many of you are aware is a site that collects evidence based information. They are interested in working with us. They are looking at adding links to Wikipedia's high quality medical content (GA/FAs and maybe B rated articles). The other idea we where discussing is if adding high quality content to the talk page of articles for further use by editors would be of any use to us. --Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:09, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Great new. Our top 3000 article should be indexed on TRIP Database come next week :-) Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:38, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

They are now index. Listed as etextbooks from 2010. Here is an example [44] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 16:34, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

This is cool. Thanks James. I'm puzzled about ordering of articles. If you search for "Autism", "Dengue" or "Tourette syndrome" you find related WP articles appear higher up than the core article. This is with the default sort order of "relevance". Colin°^Talk 18:44, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

ECGPedia/EchoPedia

In discussion today they have agreed to release about 2000 ECG images aswell as a number of US images. A batch upload is being worked on here [45] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 20:24, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Template:RSPlease

Template:RSPlease could use some loving attention and perhaps a copyeditor. Also, Diberri's ref tool seems to be dead, so it probably shouldn't continue to recommend it. Holek's, maybe? (I'd be happier about that tool if it would strip leading spaces off my copy-and-paste PMID numbers, and didn't split the authors' initials and last names into separate parameters.)

I'm out of time for now; perhaps someone else would like to have a go at it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:54, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

Have you tried the cite option in the toolbar? Above the edit field: cite -> templates -> cite journal, fill in the pmid, click the auto-fill button and you are ready, no external tools needed. --WS (talk) 18:55, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

What autofill button? Under "Journal" I get buttons labeled "<Last name", "Add citation", and "Preview citation".

Once upon a time, there was a link there that depended on Diberri's tool working, but that appears to be gone now. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:16, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

I fixed the link to diberri's tool (which is still running). Under Cite, then Templates, then Cite Journal, you can put in the PMID and hit the magnifying glass icon to autofill the rest of the cite; I still prefer diberri, though. Yobol (talk) 23:19, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

What magnifying glass icon?

When I open the edit window, the first button in the toolbar looks like this:

Clicking that icon gives me multiple buttons, one of which is "Journal". None of them are named "Templates". Clicking the "Journal" button opens a fill-in-the-blank screen, which contains a PMID blank. However, there are no icons within four inches of the PMID blank. The only icon is , which is next to "DOI". WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:37, 17 July 2011 (UTC)

Apparently we have different options in the edit menu. I do not see any of those icons. Yobol (talk) 20:59, 17 July 2011 (UTC)

That looks like you have the RefToolbar 1.0 (you have probably enabled it manually in the past). Version 2.0 is now enabled for all users by default and includes the autofill feature. You can check if you have enabled the old version in Special:MyPage/monobook.js, just delete all references to the old version there.--WS (talk) 08:44, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

Diberri's tool works fine. It can be found here. Colin°^Talk 21:17, 17 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks Colin, I've been using the wrong URL for ages! JFW | T@lk 00:23, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

looking to get an image donation of a photo of an HF burn victim

Any advice on an academic or other source,that I could write and get an image of HF burn victim? I am fine writing for a donation, just not having good look via Google with a high target source. Ideas? TCO (reviews needed) 22:23, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

Academic source like a boss. [46] --FunkyDuffy (talk) 02:38, 16 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, writing him now!TCO (reviews needed) 20:42, 17 July 2011 (UTC)

E. coli

I thought I might notify that I have gone ahead and split E.coli (which was heavily unbalanced in section length), which now comprises:

• the E. coli main page (general overview and description of the species= ecology point of view)
• Pathogenic Escherichia coli (E.coli from the medical point of view)
• Escherichia coli (molecular biology) (E.coli from the biochemist/geneticist point of view)
• Escherichia coli (disambiguation) for all the strains which have pages

Any help is appreciated in fixing all issues resulting from copy-edits and improving the new page Pathogenic Escherichia coli (or should it be E. coli (pathogenic)? etc).--Squidonius (talk) 07:26, 17 July 2011 (UTC)

Kudos for making a big change in a high-profile page with little/no apparent controversy. I see this as a very constructive change. No doubt there will be tweaks, but it's very nice work! -- Scray (talk) 15:14, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

Complaint at OTRS about our article Adhesive capsulitis of shoulder

The specific complaint is "to release the pain is not hot is cool like ice. You say hot i have frozen shoulder and i did put hot and getting worse until i have see my doctor and say ice is like a anti inflamatory. So you need to correct you article thanks" Looking at the article it seems to be giving a lot of uncited medical advice. I'd appreciate it if someone could take a look at this. Dougweller (talk) 05:55, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

Not really able to understand the editors concerns? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 16:03, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

The article is inadequately referenced. The Talk page has recent requests for medical advice, which I have flagged. -- Scray (talk) 14:23, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

I've removed a lot of uncited management advice from the article. It can be restored if refactored and adequately cited. Thanks for the heads-up. -- Scray (talk) 14:52, 19 July 2011 (UTC)