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Cochrane reviews

The WMF has agreements with a number of cell phone companies to give free access (without data charges) to all of Wikipedia to 470 million people. If people however click on our references via their cellphone they will incur data charges.

Have been in discussions with Wiley regarding the release of the abstracts of Cochrane reviews under a CC-BY-SA license and hopefully the entire paper under this license one day. My hope is that it might be possible to place theses abstracts somewhere within Wikipedia and link them from the references thus allowing our readers via the cellphone partnerships to get free access. I have discussed this with Kul and he does not see it as a concern. What are peoples thoughts? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 12:54, 23 September 2013 (UTC)

Material released under CC-BY-SA can be changed by anyone for any reason (e.g., adding the word "not" in the middle to completely change the meaning). If I were an author, I'd insist on CC-BY-ND (no derivatives/no tinkering with the wording). WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:13, 23 September 2013 (UTC)
The standard copyright in open access publishing is in fact CC-BY. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 15:14, 23 September 2013 (UTC)
the standard copyright desired by most advocates of open access is CC-BY. Some OA publishers use variations on this.As for ND, one of the presuppositions of OA publishing is secure archiving, so an authentic copy remains available. Just as with WP. People can mess up our articles, but we get the proper versions back again from the article history. 'DGG (at NYPL) (talk) 21:34, 23 September 2013 (UTC)
We could of course begin by placing copies of Open Access (CC-BY) publications we use on Wikipedia right now. And than this could be a justification we could give to push more publishers to use open access copyright. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 09:11, 24 September 2013 (UTC)
Isn't Wikisource intended for such hosting? Adrian J. Hunter(talk•contribs) 04:44, 25 September 2013 (UTC)
I agree, Wikipedia is not the correct place for such work -- some other WMF site would be better. Colin°Talk 07:34, 25 September 2013 (UTC)
The point is to get access to people via cell phones (via the agreement that some companies will provide free access to WP). It will allow another potentially 470 million people to verify what they read on Wikipedia without incurring data charges when what is referred to is a CC BY document. Doing this may also convince Cochrane to release their reviews under an open license.
Maybe people who are accessing WP from the developing world via their cellphones do not care about the references and may not be interested in becoming editors. But I am not willing to write them off without even giving them a chance. This move would allow them to 1) find free reference material 2) edit Wikipedia, all for free. We are not putting this material within the articles. This material is just as much for editors as it is for readers. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 13:07, 25 September 2013 (UTC)
WhatamIdoing writes "Material released under CC-BY-SA can be changed by anyone for any reason (e.g., adding the word "not" in the middle to completely change the meaning)". This is not true. The licence does not make it a wiki. The original abstract by the original authors (+ whatever editing the journal does) is copyright and the authors have rights over it and any copies made. If the text is is published in a form that does not allow open editing (which I would certainly advise), then it will come to no harm. If you made a copy and published such a copy with textual differences (beyond the most trivial) -- an adaptation -- then you would (a) no longer be able to claim it was the abstract for that paper (but rather, a work based on the abstract and are required to clearly state that it has been modified) and (b) no longer be able to claim the original authors were the sole authors. Furthermore, you mustn't imply the original authors endorse your change. The CC licence asserts the user's moral rights, so if the original authors feel your change represents a "derogatory treatment" of the work (which changing the meaning of a scientific paper absolutely would) then they can demand you remove any mention of their names from it. Colin°Talk 07:34, 25 September 2013 (UTC)
Which, unfortunately, won't stop people from doing it anyway. Under the current rules, at least they can get sued for copyvios or file a take-down notice when they do it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:30, 25 September 2013 (UTC)

Do people think adding CC BY articles we use as refs to someplace on Wikipedia so that those who get free WP access via their cell phone can get free journal article access as well is a good idea? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 21:50, 25 September 2013 (UTC)

That sentence has no. Looie496 (talk) 15:55, 26 September 2013 (UTC)
Which sentence has "no"? Not sure what you mean. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 23:13, 26 September 2013 (UTC)
Dependent predicate, maybe? I think you're missing the words "is a good idea", or words to that effect at the end. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:20, 27 September 2013 (UTC)
Ah see it now. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 11:41, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

Neuroscience class

People might want to keep an eye on the topics that are being proposed for new articles at Education Program:Georgia Institute of Technology/Introduction to Neuroscience (Fall 2013). Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 19:12, 26 September 2013 (UTC)

It may be a good idea to inform the participants there of the existence of this WikiProject and that they can get help here about the specific requirements and standards for medical articles. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 20:29, 26 September 2013 (UTC)
Thanks for the notice and very good of you to help them out, Biosthmors. Having run through the list of titles I would recommend that students do a search for existing content on many of the articles before creating their own articles, as I think that would be (a) needless duplication of existing content, (b) liable to create an article that will have exceedingly low readability; or (c) creating an article that already exists under an alternate name.
For example, these articles (eg. Perisynaptic (Terminal) Schwann Cells; Cholinergic Neuron; Twice Exceptional Neurobiology; Lower Limb Neuromechanics; Neural Control of Limb Stiffness) may have existing articles full of content that could do with a sectional expansion or rewrite; (Temporoparietal Junction) looks to be a spelling mistake; and some are probably best covered as two separate articles or a section in a parent article (eg Estrogen and Neurodegenerative Diseases).
That said, there also appear to be some really good articles proposed including (Neuroeffector Junction, Nerve Staining, Frontostriatal circuits) that could do with some expansion, and I think it's great that this class is working in WP. Next month I will start wiki-linking from existing articles to any articles that have been created. LT90001 (talk) 21:29, 26 September 2013 (UTC)

A centralised point of discussion for this topic can be found here, on the WP:Neuroscience talk page. LT90001 (talk) 11:01, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

And the course page now links to that section at WikiProject Neuroscience as well, so presumably the students will be reading everyone's feedback. One title with the word "syndrome" is in it so far. Best. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 16:01, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

Development of existing partnership with UCSF

University of California San Francisco's medical program is continuing to develop their Wikipedia collaboration. See their report. This is supported by some participants in meta:Wiki Project Med. Blue Rasberry (talk) 15:36, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

We have a developing course page: Wikipedia:WikiProject Medicine/UCSF Elective 2013. I've made some recent edits. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 16:03, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

Prevalence of female genital mutilation by country‎ article

Recent changes are being made to this article by very new editor ‎MissMargaretBlack (talk · contribs). Eyes other than mine on these changes, or the article as a whole, seem as though they would be very useful. I have not yet examined all of MissMargaretBlack's changes, as I am busy with other matters on and off (especially off) Wikipedia at the moment. I'm reverting vandalism and other unconstructive edits intermittently, like I usually do these days. Flyer22 (talk) 18:37, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

Hello, please go easy on the newbies. These changes seem to be well-written and sourced. There doesn't seem to be any conflict editing or reversion or deletion of the work of other editors. Unless there's something specific that you're referring to I see no problem with this new editor's contributions. LT90001 (talk) 23:28, 27 September 2013 (UTC)
It's not that I don't know about WP:Don't bite the newbies (I haven't bitten MissMargaretBlack); it's that, as repeatedly shown at the Wikipedia:Education noticeboard, there are very good reasons to be alert to new Wikipedians editing Wikipedia medical articles or Wikipedia articles in general. It's a common matter that extends far beyond student editors. The significant majority of the time...newbies need guidance and their edits need correcting and/or tweaking. Flyer22 (talk) 06:41, 28 September 2013 (UTC)

New article about a Florida urologist Thomas G Cangiano up for deletion

I WP:PRODded Thomas G. Cangiano because as-written it does not clearly show that the person is notable. However, he is close, which means that if there is something I missed or something the author missed he very well might be actually notable.

Please read the article and clarify notability and de-prod the article if he is notable or if he is not, consider adding {{prod2}}. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 02:11, 28 September 2013 (UTC)

Perineal dilator salesmanship

The article perineal dilator cites a handful of sources from one company about its product. The device is also mentioned at Episiotomy as if it were a common option. Searching PubMed gets just a few hits focusing on severe situations like vaginal agenesis. [1] I am leaning toward the notion of doing something drastic to the article - suggestions? Wnt (talk) 22:32, 28 September 2013 (UTC)

I've trimmed the promotional stuff and poorly-sourced medical claims. [2] Good find, Wnt. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 01:01, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

Article in the NYTs about WPMED

[3] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 01:58, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

"Wikipedia editing will force students to think clearly and avoid jargon, he said." Well, we can always hope. Looie496 (talk) 03:33, 30 September 2013 (UTC)
While we will try to help them avoid jargon. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 04:19, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

I just submitted a request for a small very small grant to rework the project page

Hello all. I've wanted to help rework the project page for a while now. I've made quite a few edits, but I'd like to take it to the next level (with consensus of course, and an old idea I had along these lines was shared here.) Given that this ambition has been on my to-do list for too long, I've decided to submit an Individual Engagement Grant to the tune of $300 (now reduced to $10) dollars to force me focus on the task. Your input at m:Grants:IEG/A redesigned WikiProject Medicine page would be appreciated. Thanks. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 18:46, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

What sort of changes do you think will improve our project page? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 19:52, 30 September 2013 (UTC)
Making it more concise/professional looking by playing around with User:Biosthmors/TestProjectPage, perhaps. Improving the navigation bar. Maybe doing some consolidation. I think there are too many options and people can get lost or overwhelmed (I remember a newbie said that a while back about our project page. They didn't know where to start.) Stuff like that. There's a ridiculous amount of whitespace in the FA section see User:Biosthmors/sandbox for a mock-up that's more concise. Too bad I messed up the dates there. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 21:10, 30 September 2013 (UTC)
Hi Biosthmors, I can't say I agree with this. Firstly and primarily, I don't think this is fair or equitable considering the large amount of non-paid Wikipedians who put time and edit into editing this encyclopedia. Secondly, I don't think this is fair because I am sure the editing effort will involve other editors who will not be compensated. Thirdly, I would be discouraged that money solicited by Wikipedia's advertisements for administrative fees would be spent on such an end (which to me is a little misleading). Fourthly, I am in totalis against the idea of paid editing. Fifthly, I think that this disincentivises further unpaid edits to the project and its pages. Lastly, this is already an active Wikiproject and that an improved page wouldn't really add that much benefit, whereas a targeted grant (if there was some imperative this money be spent on Wikimed) would be better spent on improving a top-priority stub or low-quality popular page. So in conclusion, although I can see renovating the project page is very important, I quite strongly object to this grant. Kindly, LT90001 (talk) 02:26, 1 October 2013 (UTC)
The grant program does not provide direct support for content creation. I have doubts that this grant proposal will be accepted, but if it is, it will mean that the project is considered organizational rather than content-creating. Looie496 (talk) 03:30, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

I feel strongly that the page must remain easy to edit. I do not mind it being improved but I want even newbies to be able to make changes to it. I would struggle to edit the military page. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 03:46, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

If you enable section editing, craziness like that page is much more simple to tackle, but I get the point that newbies will not have this enabled. I support improvements on that page. "Visual analogue" goal progress bars look great. Generally I think a more colorful, professional looking page will foster more interest in the wikiproject. Lesion (talk) 10:10, 1 October 2013 (UTC)
Given the responses so far, I'm going to reduce the grant amount down to a token payment of $10. I'll have to submit mid-term and final-reports, etc. on this project. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 06:20, 1 October 2013 (UTC)
Thanks Lesion. And thanks also to Doc James, because I think it's great you mentioned the problem of material being tucked away into templates. My other "micro-grant" (for $40 dollars) is to address that problem in relation to training materials. See m:Grants:IEG/Comprehensive and wiki-like training pages where I propose to take slides like this one: Wikipedia:Training/Newcomers/Talk pages (click edit there) to present them in one scroll down page. I propose to do this for all the WP:Trainings, which can have many slides. If anyone has a problem with me getting $40 dollars to do this, I can also reduce that dollar amount down to a token $10. Or if you don't have a problem with me getting $40 dollars for this, then maybe you could support my grant proposal over there. Thanks. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 10:38, 1 October 2013 (UTC)
I am happy with the amount you have applied for. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 03:05, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

International medical information conference

Should we invite the "information dissemination decision-makers" from the WHO, the world's major medical education charities, and relevant government and specialist bodies to a conference, to discuss strategies and create opportunities to collaborate in the building of easily identified comprehensive and reliable free medical medical information online? --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 01:05, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

See Category:Medical conferences and http://www.allconferences.com.
—Wavelength (talk) 01:51, 1 October 2013 (UTC)
Which conference? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 03:43, 1 October 2013 (UTC)
I'm suggesting we host something. Or, more precisely, you. It should be held in North America or Europe and my health won't permit me to attend. I have something small in mind. A summit, if you like. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 05:20, 1 October 2013 (UTC)
Hum, there must be a similar conference that we can all just go to and meet at. If we can get interest we could have a whole section of medical talks at Wikimania. I am not much of a conference organizer. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 05:50, 1 October 2013 (UTC)
The next Wikimania will be in London. I wonder if BMG or a med school or somebody would be interested in a BOF ("birds of a feather") session (because it would be good to "flock together" with people who are interested in the same things that we are). WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:33, 1 October 2013 (UTC)
I've left a note at the Wikimania website. I presume the WMF will pay airfares and accommodation for invitees. If the Wikimania organisers aren't able to provide the space or help organising tickets and accommodation, perhaps WM:UK would be willing to arrange something for us concurrent with Wikimania and close to the venue. I'll keep on the Wikimania organisers for a commitment, and keep this board informed.
If anyone has reservations about this I'd appreciate them speaking up early.
Ideas about whom to invite are welcome - either the type of organisation or specific individuals. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 23:22, 1 October 2013 (UTC)
Most of our partners are much more wealthy than we and should hopefully be able to pay their own way. I would invite the CDC, NIH, WHO, NHS, Cochrane, PLoS medicine, Open BMJ, Translators Without Borders etc. I think a number of these organizations are planning on coming anyway :-) Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 03:03, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Peyote

There has been some edit-warring on this page over the inclusion of negative names for peyote. As I've been involved, I'm reluctant to do more, so I would be grateful if someone from this project would look at Peyote#Long-term psychoactive use, which seems to me not in accord with WP:MEDRS. Peter coxhead (talk) 10:05, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

I've tried to reword this in accordance with WP:MEDRS, which states that some primary sources can be used, but with caution. Doing a quick google scholar scan reveals no secondary sources, so I think it's reasonable to report the findings. LT90001 (talk) 13:04, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

Alternative Medicine Pages

I think there should also a focus on the alternative medicine pages. I feel that these pages seem in many cases to give too much credence to practices that often seem to be lacking in evidence or only supported by poorly conducted trials. It seems, particularly in the case of Chiropractic that too much weight is given to trials that show little benefit, and their seems to be NPOV issues where people's livelihood is based on what scientifically is often regarded as pseudoscience. After all, it's just as important to show what 'medical' treatment has no effect (or is possibly dangerous) as to show what is effective Macgroover (talk) 17:43, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

Alt med is controversial. Please join in the discussion. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 03:00, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Neuromodulation (Medicine)

Hello again, medical experts. The above submission at Afc may be of interest. —Anne Delong (talk) 21:51, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

Done. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 02:24, 2 October 2013 (UTC)
Thanks! —Anne Delong (talk) 02:35, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Collaboration of the Month (November)

New thread so that we don't have an extremely long one thru next month. Consensus seems to be Digestive Diseases in the style of a barn raising (heh) LT90001 (talk) 06:14, 6 October 2013 (UTC)

Recent changes/Medicine

There once was a bot maintained by Rich Farmborough that fed recent changes to medical articles (articles with this project's template on their talk page) into page like a watchlist. Since Rich was blocked from bot work, it has fallen into disrepair. Is there an alternative page that displays recent changes to medical articles? --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 02:22, 28 September 2013 (UTC)

If you are looking for articles to edit, the closest equivalent I can find is here, the Medicine reclassification log. That said, it is my personal feeling that there is adequate oversight of medicine articles. LT90001 (talk) 02:28, 28 September 2013 (UTC)
"Adequate oversight"? I'm not sure I understand you.
For about 18 months - until about a year ago - I would begin my day by opening that Recent changes/Medicine log and slowly work through the changes since my last session - checking for vandalism, checking sources, welcoming new editors, etc. I found this to be very rewarding work and, I think, quite useful; but got busy and dropped it. I'd like to start again. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 02:40, 28 September 2013 (UTC)
Hmm, I've had a look for some more options and the only other two I have found since are for someone to directly provide you with their watchlist (as you can copy/past watchlists), or to use the Article Alerts system. Sorry for any misinterpretation; the work of the WikiGnome to which I believe you allude is valuable and often under-appreciated. LT90001 (talk) 06:26, 28 September 2013 (UTC)

Got it. Peter James at WP:VPT pointed out Transcluded changes - template:WikiProject Medicine. Does anyone mind if I put this on the WP:MED front page? --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 02:37, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

Go for it. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 04:25, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

Related to this seems to be what should be an important function, in my mind, so thanks for actively working on this global issue at mw:Mentorship_programs/Possible_projects#Ranking_articles_by_Pageviews_for_Wikiprojects_and_Task_Forces_in_Languages_other_than_English James—to make the vision a reality. So why can't we just have a WikiProject Medicine watchlist? Or any other WikiProject watchlist? Why can't we have a featured articles watchlist? Or a good articles watchlist? Or whatever kind of watchlist we want? Sorry that's more something for the WP:Village pumps but still. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 10:31, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Diarrhea in Developing Regions

Hello Wikipedia, My name is Jordan, I am an undergraduate at Rice University, and I am here to propose the writing of a new Wikipedia article on Diarrhea in Developing Regions. Diarrheal diseases are among the most prolific in the world, accounting for a significant fraction of all infections, as well as a massive number of child mortalities. Given that children with diarrhea are significantly more likely to die, most within the first two years of life, Diarrheal diseases are a serious threat to the livelihood of children globally. Clearly, diarrheal disease is a significant issue in developing regions, and I hope to use this Wikipedia entry to outline the impacts of diarrheal disease, elucidate the primary causes of the issue (usually linking back to poverty and limited access to vital resources and human capabilities) and finally discuss both potential solutions and those that have already been implemented in these at-risk regions. I will draw my information from a variety of academic sources, mainly from journal articles, but also from information and data made available by some of the major organizations interested in this topic such as the CDC, and WHO. Though a page already exists on the topic of Diarrhea, it approaches the topic from a highly scientific/medical perspective which is incompatible with my approach and proposed writing on this topic, which will take a point of view more oriented around the concepts of poverty, justice and human capabilities. Another related page, Diseases of poverty, already exists, however this article approaches a number of different diseases with depth; if I were to add to this page, my content would dramatically outweigh the content on any other disease. Instead of extending on these pages, I propose the development of a new page on the topic of Diarrhea in Developing Regions, which will focus on the topics I outlined above. In order to supplement the existing articles, I plan to add small sections to these pages with a brief summary of the information that will be present on the proposed page, and add links between these three pages. Any comments, questions, or suggestions that I can use to improve my work are greatly appreciated! -- Best, Jpoles1 (talk) 20:48, 28 September 2013 (UTC)

That looks like a very worthy idea to me. Some random thoughts:
  • Presumably you'd have some emphasis on watsan and on other technical aspects of development?
  • It's quite hard to get an article started nowadays - if you're less experienced creating articles, it could be a good idea to start a draft in your userspace and then take it "live" when it's improved a bit.
  • Sources are vitally important - they should underlie everything you write (but don't just copy & paste).
  • If you need any help with the obscure wiki-technical stuff, just ask.
Good luck! bobrayner (talk) 21:06, 28 September 2013 (UTC)
This sounds great. The main article at Diarrhea should have a section called ==Society and culture==, which could give a paragraph or two summarizing your subtopic, and a link to the proposed article at Diarrhea in developing regions. That will improve the main article and also dramatically increase the likelihood of people finding and reading your new one.
Look over WP:MEDRS for information on sources. We generally like secondary sources, such as review article and higher level textbooks, rather than original experimental results. Secondary sources have the advantage of summarizing a lot of work, which helps us get the overall feel instead of accidentally "cherry picking" an experiment that seems interesting but might not be representative. You might want to look over sources like PMID 22796685, PMID 22480268, PMID 22436130, PMID 22419779, and PMID 21975154 as examples of possible sources. If you need help finding or evaluating sources, then just post a new note here. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:23, 29 September 2013 (UTC)
The ICDDR B probably has some useful resources. bobrayner (talk) 16:30, 29 September 2013 (UTC)
What you are interested in writing about is infectious diarrhea otherwise known as gastroenteritis. Our article on this topic already covers it fairly well. Diarrhea from eating too much fruit is not a significant public health concern, neither is that from taking laxatives. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 01:56, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

Hi All, I really appreciate all of the help being provided to support this small project. Though I recognize that articles on the subjects of both Diarrhea and Gastroenteritis exist, I hope to approach this topic from a non-medical perspective (I know, I'm probably not in the most ideal wikigroup for such an endeavor, but I think it's a productive discussion all the same), but rather from a human capabilities point of view, which focuses more on the impacts on human development and quality of life. A more detailed proposal for my work, including many of my sources, can be found at https://docs.google.com/document/d/1e8yzk7dj1MxIRIfa6aqykydIlhybukAgITgp4QDW9DY/ Thanks Again, Jpoles1 (talk) 01:50, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Hi, that article sounds like a great idea. Keeping in mind what has been said above about sources and citations and duplicating content, as a registered user you can simply be bold and create the article yourself. There are certainly a lot less notable and relevant articles that already exist. Welcome to Wikipedia and I hope you enjoy your stay :D. LT90001 (talk) 06:40, 2 October 2013 (UTC)
All articles combine both medical and non-medical content. The article on gastroenteritis has a section on "society and culture". What you are proposing is a co tract. A duplication of content we already have. The sections you mention in the doc are all medical in nature.
We have a section on epidemiology in the gastroenteritis article. We could start a subpage on Epidemiology of gastroenteritis were country by country details can be added if proper refs are found. We could also great a subsection on Management of gastroenteritis and Prevention of gastroenteritis were greater details could be placed. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 17:50, 2 October 2013 (UTC)
No, he's not. A WP:COATRACK is when you say that the article is about diarrhea in developing nations, but you instead write a page that is almost entirely about something barely related, like your complaints about the World Health Organization or the importance of vaginal childbirth, and says almost nothing about the alleged subject of the article. You might be thinking about a WP:CFORK (content fork), which involves duplicating information—but specifically, duplicating information to push one point of view, not to split up things because of their WP:SIZE.
Jpoles1 is proposing a perfectly fine {{Main}} article about a subtopic that can be properly given a WP:SUMMARY in the existing articles about gastroenteritis or diarrhea. Diarrhea in developing countries is just as good a subject as AIDS in Africa. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:15, 2 October 2013 (UTC)
Thanks WAID yes "WP:CFORK" was the term I was looking for. If one puts an in-depth discussion of the management of AIDS in the article on "AIDS in Africa" than we will have a partial WP:CFORK.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 06:33, 6 October 2013 (UTC)


Should we commission an independent study to determine the reliability, safety, clarity and comprehensiveness of Wikipedia's medical and pharmacology information?

Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 01:21, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

I remember the WMF doing something like this for Wikipedia as a whole lately, not sure if and when results are out. IMO quality of some articles are as good as any professional published literature; however, the quality of many articles is poor. Readability is also hit and miss. We are definitely less readable than most government sites / charities but IMO most people want more detail than the government sites and charities allow.
In summary we have a massive amount of work to bring Wikipedia up to a consistent high standard. We need to figure out how to get more independent and intelligent people involved. I hope that the outreach to medical schools will accomplish this. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 17:44, 2 October 2013 (UTC)
Just to be clear, do you think we need a thorough, rigorous independent analysis of the coverage, quality, safety and clarity of en.Wikipedia's medical content? If so, do you think that need would justify whatever WMF resources and volunteer effort it takes? (Personally I think we have an operational imperative and a moral duty to do whatever it takes to get this data.) --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 04:03, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
I wanted to do a trial of medical students giving one group Wikipedia, another group UpToDate, and a third nothing. Than have them write a medical exam and see which group did best. It would answer the question "which source is better for answering the questions one the licensing exams". We proposed it at the U of T Samir and I and were unable to get ethics approval.
I would say that most of it is not very good. But not horrible either. Some of it is excellent. Do we need a study to prove this? I think we would do better by spending our energies fixing the errors Wikipedia is full of. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 04:13, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
To chime in on this answer, I agree that it would be better to continue editing as it is. Such a study would have to be hit-and-miss given how much articles differ in quality, and because Wikipedia is not static it may only be relevant for a short period of time. On the other hand I empathise with your desire to improve and validate the quality of medical articles. As an aside, as well as the small risk of inaccuracies which I believe to be small, I feel the biggest problem with the medical data on Wikipedia is what is the omissions from articles; that is, relevant medical content about changes in aetiology, epidemiology and pathology and/or diagnostic tests used that have not yet been added to articles. LT90001 (talk) 13:09, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
James and LT90001:
  • Re: "I think we would do better by spending our energies fixing the errors Wikipedia is full of." "it would be better to continue editing as it is." I'm not proposing anyone stops editing, or that we change our editing norms. The most I would hope for from this project would be prior criticism of the study design, and to at least read the abstract of the results.
  • Re: "Such a study would have to be hit-and-miss given how much articles differ in quality". I'm presuming a design that would adequately take that variation into account.
  • Re: "Wikipedia is not static it may only be relevant for a short period of time." This is true of all dynamic topics (such as epidemiology).
  • Re: "the small risk of inaccuracies which I believe to be small." Your belief is valuable but until we actually know with some confidence how often people consult our medical content (a stat Blue Rasberry is seeking support for elsewhere on this page) and how much unsafe information it contains - from a well-designed scientific study - all we, the WMF, our partners, our critics and the people we serve (our readers) have to go on is our opinions. I'm personally a supporter of evidence over expert opinion, even my own. It is comforting to believe our content is safe but the possible consequences if that is a false belief are concerning, and all the necessary data and WMF funds are readily available.
All I'm looking for here is an acknowledgment that this kind of information is important. Forget about contributing any of your own time or energy to the exercise. I can't move on this with any vigor or expectation of success without significant genuine moral support from this project. The ball's in your court. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 03:53, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
With your convincing points and some reflection I do agree this is an important topic. Some suggestions for research are here: Wikipedia:WikiProject Medicine/Research. I don't think that WMF should fund this research (at least not until we're improved in quality) but a good starting point would be to have a page and further discussions where we can discuss some ways to assess the quality and utility of our articles. This has been happening in a few threads and surely will continue. LT90001 (talk) 12:45, 8 October 2013 (UTC)

I would still like to do the study I described. IMO that is one of the best and simplest ways to compare Wikipedia to UpToDate or another source. Do we have people interested in doing this study? How would it be done? We have had groups do comparisons of specific topic areas like nephrology and psyc but not of medical content generally. If someone was keen to do this I would be happy to provide feedback. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 04:36, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

I suspect that most people need more substantial support than "feedback": most people need ready access to students who will take the test. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:47, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

Amen Clinic and Daniel Amen

More eyes needed. -- [ UseTheCommandLine ~/talk ]# ▄ 03:50, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

That sounds like the kind of borderline-notable stuff that would benefit from a merge. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:54, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Start codon

Anyone know if that was an improvement off the top of their head. I seem to remember AUG though without context. I'd have to look it up. Best. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 18:15, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Yes, it looks right. AUG is the default start codon—as indicated in the article. Axl ¤ [Talk] 20:04, 2 October 2013 (UTC)
There are two kinds of start codons, one for mRNA and one for DNA. AUG is correct for mRNA, but the article should probably have something about DNA as well. ATG is listed as a possible start codon/initiation site in DNA codon table. --Mark viking (talk) 21:06, 2 October 2013 (UTC)


medical marijuana, NPOV/CITE policy, at MedMen

So this article looks entirely promotional to me, written entirely by one person. It has been tagged as WP:MED by someone else. One of my issues is that all of the links to media establishing WP:N are actually hosted on the website of the article topic. This, to me, would seem to run afoul of WP:CITE where it says that external links, when they are duplicates of other media, should be in compliance with NPOV.

I removed these links individually, as well as some sources I believe to be non-RS, and made sure to tag them as such so that they could be reverted individually. I have started a discussion on the talk page.

I would appreciate other eyes here. If i'm in error, please let me know. -- [ UseTheCommandLine ~/talk ]# ▄ 22:01, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

I haven't taken a look yet, but thanks indeed for the flag. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 08:43, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
I think your removal of sources was probably wrong. The source was listed like this:
<ref name="NPR">{{cite web|url=http://themedmen.com/uploaded/press/npr_itsyourheatlh_altmed_061013.mp3|title=NPR Interview|accessdate=September 24, 2013|publisher=NPR}}</ref>
The link is at the org's website, but the source is a story by NPR, which is an independent and reliable news agency. We might remove the link (under WP:LINKVIO), but the source should have been kept (and perhaps repointed to the URL at npr.com). This is a scanned copy of a page out of a newspaper. Unless they've gone to a lot of work in Photoshop to insert a passing mention to their company, there's no possible neutrality issue here. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:51, 3 October 2013 (UTC)


Gynecomastia

I have removed a whole gallery of pre and post op images as seen here [4] twice now as I consider one to be enough. Thoughts? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 04:32, 3 October 2013 (UTC)

To me, multiple images reinforce the idea that intervention is normal and should be done, IMO, serving as a subtle advertisement for the intervention itself, so I am fine with this. For anyone who has seen Fight Club, I surely wouldn't want the character Bob without his "bitch tits". Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 08:09, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
Thanks, I agree there is no need for an entire gallery of images as there was. LT90001 (talk) 12:58, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
Is it really necessary that we have a redirect called bitch tits to gynecomastia? I would prefer to deal with this like how cleft lip and palate deals with hare lip. Yes there it is a redirect, but in the article at least it is implied that it is a historic term, and probably more offensive now than anything else. However on gynecomastia, "bitch tits" is not even listed as a synonym. Need a source to support this questionable redirect imo ... Lesion (talk) 13:09, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
Why is it questionable? What else could it logically refer to? Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 13:12, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
It was used 70 times in the last month, for whatever it's worth. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 13:14, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
I failed to find a reliable source treating these terms as synonyms after a quick google search. "Bitch" and "tits" could be called sexist, and I personally think it would be pretty offensive for people with the condition. The page stats might indicate that we should keep it, but as it currently stands, we just have a redirect, with no discussion about the term. If it is a colloquialism, let's state this. If it is derogatory colloquialism as with hare lip, then let's say that too. Lesion (talk) 13:22, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
I think I've looked for a source myself in the past to do the same and couldn't find one so I've just left it as there's no other logical place to point the redirect. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 13:24, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
  • This source might be suitable [5]. I'm paywalled out, but I can see from the snippet preview on google scholar that it talks about this: " In common street parlance, men do not typically say that they have breasts, but refer instead to “moobs” (male boobs) or “bitch tits.” Both terms are compounded from English words that have multiple meanings. ..." Lesion (talk) 13:27, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
We could make a sentence of it in a society and culture section perhaps. Or we could put it in the lead. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 13:30, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
I have no preference. Consider:
This condition may be commonly referred to as "bitch tits" or "moobs" ("male boobs").<ref>{{cite journal|last=Wassersug|first=Richard J.|coauthors=Oliffe, John L.|title=The Social Context for Psychological Distress from Iatrogenic Gynecomastia with Suggestions for Its Management|journal=Journal of Sexual Medicine|date=1 April 2009|volume=6|issue=4|pages=989–1000|doi=10.1111/j.1743-6109.2008.01053.x}}</ref>. Lesion (talk) 13:38, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
Done. Thanks for digging that out! Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 13:56, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
I don't see a reason why we need to grace the article with this, as they are not commonly used and somewhat offensive. I do not think that the use of these slang approaches the use of other common synonyms (such as hare lip), so I am happy if a redirect exists but these are not mentioned in the article. LT90001 (talk) 23:36, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
I don't like them either, but isn't it more encyclopedic to mention them? I don't think it is good to have redirects with no explanation on the target page as to why that term points there. Per the stats posted above, some people do apparently use these terms to search for the topic. Lesion (talk) 00:36, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
And doesn't stating that they are not commonly used create dissonance with the source, which says "may be commonly referred to as"? Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 10:12, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
I went ahead and added the qualifier of "derogatory" as that's what the source says. The word I had previously inserted, slang, was too blasé. I apologize. This change helps put the words in the appropriate context, in my opinion. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 10:22, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
I agree with Doc James—one pair of photos is enough. Axl ¤ [Talk] 19:18, 3 October 2013 (UTC)

Scarless wound healing

I came across the Scarless wound healing article not too long ago today. Thoughts on it? Flyer22 (talk) 22:00, 3 October 2013 (UTC)

PubMed has some hits ... merge to wound healing imo ... Lesion (talk) 22:15, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
Marked for merge. LT90001 (talk) 00:14, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
Agree merge. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 04:38, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
Agreed. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 07:57, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
 Done


MEDRS and pay-to-play journals, Science sting

Here is something that participants in this project should be aware of. Executive summary: Science created a spoof medical paper with glaringly obvious flaws and submitted it to about 300 open-access journals that claimed to be peer-reviewed. 255 of them responded, and many of them rejected the paper, but 157 accepted it -- which basically means that no genuine peer review could have occurred. See http://www.sciencemag.org/content/342/6154/60.summary for more info, if you have online access to Science. The message for us is to emphasize that the mere fact that a paper appears in a journal that claims to be peer-reviewed does not guarantee validity. Looie496 (talk) 15:35, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

But where is the comparator in this study? Did they also submit it to closed access journals? Bad peer review is not the only issue in publishing. What about ghost writing were the "author" is found after the paper is written? People not submitting their article to trial databases before beginning and still finding journals willing to publish the resulting papers? Even when it is submitted "primary outcomes" are changed between start and finish and the journals do not care? The issue around reprints, were companies order a hundred thousand dollars worth to smooth the publication process? I agree that peer review is no guarantee of accuracy. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 16:47, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
Thanks for sharing Looie496. Good to know. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 18:13, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
The message for us is to emphasize that the mere fact that a paper appears in a journal that claims to be peer-reviewed does not guarantee validity. - This is not exactly news, and the Science study is also flawed in singling out open access journals. Even papers that pass peer review with flying colours may well be wrong: after all, theoretically perfect studies with a statistical significance threshold of 0.99 will find false results 1% of the time. What does it mean for us is complicated: mostly it means what we always do, that is we should prefer, as sources, reviews summing up the state of the art instead of individual studies, especially for controversial claims. --cyclopiaspeak! 15:41, 5 October 2013 (UTC)
I agree with all of that. My thought was really that this gives us additional ammunition for the occasional disputes with people who don't understand why MEDRS needs to be used rather than plain vanilla RS. Looie496 (talk) 16:53, 5 October 2013 (UTC)
Both WP:RS and WP:MEDRS emphasis the use of secondary sources. Agree that this science article also justifies our current position. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 01:11, 6 October 2013 (UTC)

Are mnemonics encyclopedic?

Are mnemnoics encylopedic? There seem to be quite a lot under Wikimed. I believe some are (eg. SOAP), due to their development alongside organisational efforts at reducing medical error. However, a lot seem to be shorthand memory aids for students or doctors. Is this encyclopedic? Here are some examples I have somewhat arbitrarily grouped them into ones I think are just memory aids, and ones that I would say are encyclopedic by virtue of being the target of publicity campaigns, or representing an underlying effort at organisational reform, ie have some notability or relationship to the practice of medicine, or society etc.

Encyclopedic mnemonics:

Any others that anyone else has found? Opinions? LT90001 (talk) 02:24, 5 October 2013 (UTC)

I am okay with them on their own pages. We are not a standard encyclopedia as we are not limited by paper limits. IMO they are a little undue for mention within the main articles on these diseases. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 03:16, 5 October 2013 (UTC)
Sometimes I use SOCRATES in the signs and symptoms section of articles for conditions which involve pain (e.g. Atypical_facial_pain#Signs_and_Symptoms). I will stop doing this if the consensus is it is not encyclopedic. Re articles which are about mnemonics, I would say that some are worthy of their own page and others are not. FAST would be notable imo, others which are used mainly by doctors, maybe they are not encyclopedic. Case by case basis I think... Lesion (talk) 08:57, 5 October 2013 (UTC)
In my opinion, we should have a list of medical mnemnoics and separate pages for the ones that are notable. Anything that's not notable should just be a redirect. Ideally, this would be a featured list. If medical students can use and benefit from Wikipedia while studying we can hope to get more of them editing. Best. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 11:25, 5 October 2013 (UTC)
I would imagine much potentially useful information that should be in that list has already been deleted off of Wikipedia due to short-sighted overzealousness, though. It happens on this website. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 11:29, 5 October 2013 (UTC)
My med student friend from Duke on facebook said she liked this idea of a list. She thinks it would be useful for medical students. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 11:29, 5 October 2013 (UTC)
There is indeed a list in categories (here) of mnemonics. I think that on a case-by-case basis the redirect idea is a good one as many of the mnemonics are simply 'how to' lists rather than things that should be in an encyclopedia. Perhaps some of this content could be transferred Wikiversity? (What's your opinion on this, Lesion?) LT90001 (talk) 12:47, 5 October 2013 (UTC)
Mnemonics belong, according to the existence of List_of_mnemonics#Medicine and I will argue vociferously for their inclusion. No verifiable medical mnemonic should ever have been deleted off of the site, in my opinion. They should have all be merged there, which should have already been split off. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 14:26, 5 October 2013 (UTC)
I think that very few are notable/qualify for a separate, stand-alone article. Specifically, the goal for notability is 'attention from the world at large', not being mentioned in study guides as a method of remembering something that is notable (like how to assess pain). However, I have no objection to a list that collects them all. That would be a great use for a list. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:16, 5 October 2013 (UTC)
I think that's a good position to consider. LT90001 (talk) 00:28, 6 October 2013 (UTC)
[You can find many at http://www.medicalmnemonics.com.
—Wavelength (talk) 12:33, 5 October 2013 (UTC)]

Note: Hs and Ts is up for deletion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Hs and Ts. --Mark viking (talk) 19:45, 6 October 2013 (UTC)

Cheese#Heart disease

The way rather lengthy quotations are presented on this protected page may, imo, be somewhat confusing to lay readers. Anyone rapidly skimming the text could I think be forgiven for taking away the message that evidence exists that cheese does indeed increase the risk of heart disease. (The source [6] also actually concludes "There is a lack of research examining the effect of full-fat dairy foods on CVD outcomes...") 86.162.136.32 (talk) 07:05, 5 October 2013 (UTC)

Thanks. Those long quotes are bad. And I don't see why we even need a subsection. It seems like we could summarize things with a sentence. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 16:16, 5 October 2013 (UTC)
Thanks, Biosthmors. :) One sentence or three, I feel we can communicate more clearly, whether on a medicine- or food-related page. 86.162.136.32 (talk) 21:26, 5 October 2013 (UTC)

Motor disorder

I am finally starting on the DSM-5 changes to the entire suite of TS articles. I do not have a source for a good basic definition of motor disorder; could anyone fix the first line in that article? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:11, 5 October 2013 (UTC)

How's that? Best. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 11:37, 6 October 2013 (UTC)

Merge eponymous/non-eponymous medical signs + symptoms templates?

See eg: Template:Digestive system and abdomen symptoms and signs and Template:Eponymous medical signs for digestive system and general abdominal signs

Arguments supporting merge between system signs + symptoms + eponymous signs + symptoms templates:

  • Distinction between eponymous signs and symptoms and other signs and symptoms is quite historically arbitrary.
  • Separation between eponymous/non-eponymous impacts on readability and navigability and leads to template clutter (for example see the navigation tree provided on Template:Cardiovascular system symptoms and signs)
  • I don't think many people would look through both signs and symptoms and eponymous signs and symptoms to find something.
  • No objections from creator (see here, in 2008)

I think it would be best to merge these templates and retain eponymimity in a categorisation system rather than through these templates. Opinions?

Are we sure that "template" is complete, except for the eponymous ones? They look more like general categories ("nausea"), whereas the eponymous seem very specific/rare. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:10, 6 October 2013 (UTC)
There's no guarantee of that, but either way it'd be better to have it on one nav. page. My main issue is that by far the majority of users will be using these pages to find signs + symptoms, so isolating them by whether or not they are recognised by an eponymous name is not helpful. Only a small amount of users will specifically come on to Wikipedia in order to find out about the eponymous ones alone. LT90001 (talk) 22:31, 6 October 2013 (UTC)

DOIs of Cochrane reviews

Why does the auto-fill by DOI function in the Journal citation window hardly ever manage to fill out the fields? Does anyone else find this? Lesion (talk) 11:27, 6 October 2013 (UTC)

Some search results in the Cochrane library are protocols, and are not yet listed in PubMed ... is this the issue? Lesion (talk) 11:29, 6 October 2013 (UTC)
The template filler (on the in-window edit box) pretty much never works for me with DOIs or PMIDs. I hear that it works better for other people, so perhaps it's a browser issue. I use Firefox on a Mac, with Vector for my skin, but the "old" (uglier) toolbar in this account. What do you use? WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:19, 6 October 2013 (UTC)
Not sure this is a browser or wikipedia preferences issue (for me anyway). I've never encountered a DOI that didn't autofill ... unless it was a cochrane review or similar cochrane group publication. Lesion (talk) 21:21, 6 October 2013 (UTC)

Students

Students are starting to post at WT:ANAT, FYI. I've asked a theoretical about the situation at WP:ENB. It's currently unknown what kind of supervision and guidance they are getting, but it's nice they're posting at a WikiProject at least. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 19:03, 6 October 2013 (UTC)

Great! That project has been in hibernation for a long time, and many anatomy articles are in sore need of some attention. LT90001 (talk) 22:25, 6 October 2013 (UTC)

How to describe bipolar disorder

We are having a discussion on how to describe bipolar in the lead of the article here [7]. Wondering if others would like to comment? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 21:44, 6 October 2013 (UTC)

Uncited alterations to WP:Med articles

Hi everyone, I've recently encountered an editor, user:Nikpapag, on the methylphenidate article that has been adding unsourced content to that article in spite of clearly stating that this is an issue. Moreover, after checking his edit history, I noticed that he doesn't seem to add any sources when making deletions or additions to articles (you can more or less eyeball this just by noting the consistently small number of characters changed between revisions), and some of those changes, like "bupropion is a dopamine reuptake inhibitor only," are just completely wrong - (see pharmacodynamics) http://www.accessdata.fda.gov/drugsatfda_docs/label/2001/20358s19lbl.pdf

Based upon his history with edit warring and lack of response to other editors - https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Nikpapag&oldid=553041732 - (note that he constantly blanks his talk page), I think it would be prudent to watch the edits this user makes on articles requiring wp:medrs, as he's been ignoring that policy. That said, I'm out of WP:3RR reverts, so I can't do anything more to fix the uncited additions I expect he'll re-add on the methylphenidate page.Seppi333 (talk) 22:01, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

Edit: I've notified him twice about this thread, although I don't expect a response.Seppi333 (talk) 22:03, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
The nature of the editing aside, I think the statement about ignoring talk pages has to be qualified by saying there are often detailed edit summaries. Watchlisted this article and left another note about MEDRS on the user's talkpage. Lesion (talk) 22:48, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
Good point. In any event, the lead in bupropion is still factually inaccurate from the edit I mentioned if anyone with a WP:RV to spare wants to fix it.Seppi333 (talk) 22:56, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
Anyone with a source spare would have been better, since the content that is being changed was previously uncited as far as I can see... but  Done and started a new section on the talk page anyway... Lesion (talk) 23:06, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
Thank you I linked an fda.gov medication info pdf with the pharmacodynamics and relevant info above, but I'll just re-link it and state what it says here for convenience. http://www.accessdata.fda.gov/drugsatfda_docs/label/2001/20358s19lbl.pdf
On the first page: "Pharmacodynamics: Bupropion is a relatively weak inhibitor of the neuronal uptake of norepinephrine, serotonin, and dopamine, and does not inhibit monoamine oxidase."Seppi333 (talk) 23:14, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
Could that source be used in the article? Lesion (talk) 23:34, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
It could, but it's from 2001, so to better satisfy wp:meddate, here's the newest revision of prescribing information from 2013 (more technical format, but it has more info for re-sourcing): http://www.accessdata.fda.gov/drugsatfda_docs/label/2013/018644s045,020358s052lbl.pdf
It's worth noting that it doesn't say it's a serotonin reuptake inhibitor in that revision.

Pharmacodynamics: The neurochemical mechanism of the antidepressant effect of bupropion is not known. Bupropion is a relatively weak inhibitor of the neuronal uptake of norepinephrine and dopamine, and does not inhibit monoamine oxidase or the re-uptake of serotonin.
— US FDA

Seppi333 (talk) 01:31, 8 October 2013 (UTC)

Just reverted another edit on Methylphenidate which was referenced with 2 unreliable sources and a textbook which did not support the content. Talk:Methylphenidate#Nikpapag_edit. Lesion (talk) 10:56, 8 October 2013 (UTC)

Disruptive editing in progress

Special:Contributions/Michaelmodaf. I'm out of 3RR reverts. Seppi333 (talk) 22:55, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

Requesting a quick rating review for B-class on adderall

Can another editor take a look at adderall and decide if it's worthy of a B rating? I'd do it myself, but that would be a bit biased, as I've just made a lot of edits to it. If there's any issues preventing it from obtaining that rating, just note them here so I can address them in the future.
Thanks, Seppi333 (talk) 03:18, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

Doesn't seem to have major issues. Upgraded. LT910001 (talk) 04:00, 13 October 2013 (UTC)
Thank you for taking the time to review that! Seppi333 (talk) 04:14, 13 October 2013 (UTC)


Collaboration of the month for October?

Gastrointestinal cancer, one of 14 high-importance articles listed as stubs in the project. And it looks horrible! Any interest? Best. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 22:43, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

  • Looking at the articles that have been previous collaborative of the month, I think it would be a very positive thing to start this again ... Lesion (talk) 23:05, 22 September 2013 (UTC)
  • I tried to keep up with it for a while. The problem with a collaboration is that it only works if you have more than one person actually show up and do something. The response is frequently, "you be bold, but I'm busy with my own stuff". If I were making suggestions, I'd add that it's helpful to have several high-quality but still free/online sources identified in advance, and at least two people who are committed to doing most of the work. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:11, 23 September 2013 (UTC)
    • Good point. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 09:41, 24 September 2013 (UTC)
    • Yes, good point. Is anyone aware of groups that have effective collaborations? (WP:Hurricanes with its substantial amount of good articles may). One way of arranging it could be to have one or two editors who are willing to do a substantive edit, and then having another group of editors expand sections. I have a feeling that some editors (like me) would be up to editing a section or two but may not have the time, specific knowledge or bravery of other editors to make larger changes. LT90001 (talk) 10:17, 24 September 2013 (UTC)
Committed help
  • Biosthmors
  • Lesion
Minor edits / section editing
Good sources

Please feel free to deprecate or propose alternate sources in the list above.

Model article

I am sorry to sound discouraging, but I don't think that the article should be expanded in this way. "Gastrointestinal cancer" is a collection of disparate diseases—different pathological processes, different treatments, different prognoses. The article should be no more than a simple list or a disambiguation page. Axl ¤ [Talk] 20:45, 25 September 2013 (UTC)

Maybe ... Efforts might indeed be better directed at the individual pages for the subtypes of GI cancers? This page may be high importance, but I wonder how many people will visit it compared to say, how many visit gastric cancer ... Lesion (talk) 20:51, 25 September 2013 (UTC)
Hey, I think think that's a great idea. If we're going to do collaborations of the month, I don't think we should expand too quickly or we'll run out of steam; this small article (whilst with not too many views) seems like a good place to start. It seems like the next month's has also been nominated too (malaria, in the above discussion). I think it might be a good idea for the collaboration discussions to be kept on the main talk page to encourage interest, discussion and also to ensure that the collaborations don't die out from lack of interest or attention (which they might when isolated). LT90001 (talk) 11:50, 26 September 2013 (UTC)
I was thinking summary style article might be good. Basically a subheading of each type with a short paragraph giving key epidemiology stats, prognosis, causes and treatment. As long as the sections were kept short this basically would look like a list. Lesion (talk) 20:55, 25 September 2013 (UTC)
Agree, summary style with not too much detail is good. LT90001 (talk) 11:50, 26 September 2013 (UTC)
For example, head and neck cancer is a much more substantial article than a simple list. Lesion (talk) 20:57, 25 September 2013 (UTC)
I like what Lesion has been doing there.
I like the idea of descriptions that are longer than a disambiguation page would be, but still pretty brief. If you want something more list-like overall, it could probably get tagged as a {{set index}} ("all the things that are called GI cancer"). But if you just want to mention the rarer ones, and leave fuller explanations for the main ones, then then list at the end of Leukemia#Classification might be a reasonable model for the rarer ones. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:42, 26 September 2013 (UTC)

Done before the month started?

From the great work of Lesion/Axl, I would say we're way past presenting something embarrassing, which was my main concern, so maybe we should pick something else? I think getting things from embarrassing to acceptable is a better result overall than focusing on the good to make it fantastic. Does anyone else want to find an embarrassing article that might not be too hard to cleanup? Awesome. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 10:11, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

Digestive disease? --WS (talk) 11:40, 30 September 2013 (UTC)
GI cancer still needs a bit of attention IMO. Personally I wouldn't expand any section longer than the esophageal cancer section is currently... Lesion (talk) 11:43, 30 September 2013 (UTC)
Not done yet! I'll update the liver cancer & colorectal cancer sections with sources soon. I see what you all mean about expanding this a little. We can use the sourced updates from the stubs to update their parent articles as we go along... many of them are quite deficient. LT90001 (talk) 12:44, 1 October 2013 (UTC)
Feel free to keep working on GI cancer (thankfully it's no longer a pile of crap) but digestive disease looks like a good crap target, thanks WS. I say we make that the October collaboration of the month. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 10:24, 2 October 2013 (UTC)
I'd have no trouble with making GI cancer be September and October, and then DD be November, but whatever's chosen, someone needs to update the page at WP:MCOTW and ideally spam a few requests for help to people's user talk pages. If people don't know about it, then nobody can help. We want something more like a barn raising than like one person doing all the work and a couple of us cheering him along from the sidelines. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:01, 2 October 2013 (UTC)
That sounds good to me. I'll consider that consensus. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 17:18, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Not done yet!

Alright. If Gastrointestinal cancer is still this month's collaboration, let's get some more focus so we can try and elevate this to at least a B class article, ideally GA, seeing as we have 4+ interested editors. LT90001 (talk) 06:14, 6 October 2013 (UTC)

Thanks the the committment. =) But I have to say I've dropped out on this one, because it's no longer an embarassing article, so I don't feel the need to stop the bleeding, so to speak. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 08:23, 6 October 2013 (UTC)
No worries! I've refactored the COTM page and added the little template above to denote this month's collaboration. LT90001 (talk) 08:15, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

Scope, completeness, and accuracy of medicine and drug information in Wikipedia.

What's the latest reliable findings on this, please? --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 03:04, 29 September 2013 (UTC)

Havn't seen anything new recently. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 04:23, 30 September 2013 (UTC)
I also feel that what I want to see does not yet exist. See Wikipedia:WikiProject Medicine/Wikipedia and medicine for what has been identified. Blue Rasberry (talk) 19:15, 30 September 2013 (UTC)
Thanks for that link. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 01:21, 1 October 2013 (UTC)
A scoping review was just published and summarized all the information about the quality of information within Wikipedia http://www.jmir.org/2013/10/e210/. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Patrick Archambault (talk • contribs) 04:25, 9 October 2013‎
Thanks for that, Patrick. There's a goldmine of links there. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 12:04, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

Media mention

Have you seen this? Should we respond? Should I Be Getting Health Information From Wikipedia? NCurse work 07:35, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

I would say so, but I haven't read the article. I've just been plotting to start a centralized place to do so from. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 07:58, 2 October 2013 (UTC)
Dr Azzam's project has been described before in the lay press—I think that Doc James highlighted it. The article already gives the message that we want to send. There is no need to respond. Although I want to copy-edit the article. Axl ¤ [Talk] 08:27, 2 October 2013 (UTC)
Yes both myself and User:Ocaasi are very much involved in this. While not 100% correct it is not bad. I encourage people who are interested in commenting to do so. I would encourage everyone to watch list this page Wikipedia:WikiProject_Medicine/UCSF and help out. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 17:33, 2 October 2013 (UTC)
To be more specific, I'll point to Wikipedia:WikiProject Medicine/UCSF Elective 2013, which looks like it will be the Wikipedia:Course page. I plan to jot down my ideas for assignments there (or on the talk page there) this weekend, before I share them with User:Amin Azzam. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 11:21, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
I have added this article to a new WikiProject Medicine - Press & Publications page, which attempts to record mentions of Medicine-related content in Wikipedia in the media. LT90001 (talk) 01:12, 11 October 2013 (UTC)

Health information on Wikipedia

NCurse, of course we should respond in some way. Biosthmors, yes, Wikipedians should have a central place to coordinate other Wikipedians who want guidance in doing PR on behalf of the movement. Lots of people already do this anyway so it seems worth regulating if people can be asked to voluntarily agree. Axl, these media mentions are becoming more numerous and I think that a proper response is a Wikipedia article documenting them. Blue Rasberry (talk) 15:02, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

A lot of people ask me if health information on Wikipedia matters and I do not know what to tell them. I need help. In my mind, if Wikipedia articles are getting significant amounts of traffic then these articles are important. If they are not getting much traffic then they are less important, and if they get a lot of traffic, then they are more important. How do other people here feel about that rationale? Some content is more important than other content, but generally, traffic is a reasonable measure of importance, right?

I have trouble explaining to people that Wikipedia articles get significant amounts of traffic because the data behind this belief is not robust. I made a page on meta - meta:Wiki Project Med/traffic - which I am about to send to the Wikimedia analytics mailing list and maybe some other places and to Wikimedia Foundation people. In this page I say that I want data and WMF backing to support my making the following statement - "Health information on Wikipedia gets significant amounts of traffic." If I am empowered with evidence to make that assertion, then I would feel a lot more able to say, "Because significant numbers of people are using this health information, anyone who has a stake in providing health information ought to consider the Wikipedia articles which themselves are significant sources for this information." Thoughts from anyone? I might like comments on the meta page. To what extent does this sound like a reasonable request?

Also... I have been asked by a certain journal to write something about Wikipedia and medical information. I would like to be able to say something about traffic to health content on Wikipedia, if anything could be said that the Wikimedia Foundation could back me on. Blue Rasberry (talk) 20:02, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Traffic numbers seem like a reasonable request to me, but traffic doesn't tell the whole story. For instance, how many of those visits are bots mining WP info? Perhaps Google PageRank could be useful. It is one purported measure of a page's importance and it is undeniable that one reason WP articles get so much traffic is the articles' high rank in a typical Google search. --Mark viking (talk) 22:43, 2 October 2013 (UTC)
Often the sidebar of a google search includes the first para of a wikipedia article, where appropriate. are those counted as hits, or is google caching that information? anyone know? -- [ UseTheCommandLine ~/talk ]# ▄ 22:58, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

I support this 100%. Without rigorous data, we're flying blind. I've asked Sarah, who is part of the community liaison team, for input. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 03:29, 3 October 2013 (UTC)

No they are not counted as hits. It also appears that google has gone with the NIH for health info rather than Wikipedia. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 03:50, 3 October 2013 (UTC)

We can make comments such as WP medical content gets about 200 million hits. I say that it is one of the most used medical resources in the world and likely the most used resource. Doubt the WMF would be in an any stronger position to comment on this than we are. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 04:17, 3 October 2013 (UTC)

There is also this story on Daily Dot website that urges doctors to edit Wikipedia. Liz Read! Talk! 18:37, 3 October 2013 (UTC)

I have also added this article to a new WikiProject Medicine - Press & Publications page, which attempts to record mentions of Medicine-related content in Wikipedia in the media. LT90001 (talk) 01:12, 11 October 2013 (UTC)


Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/LakePharma

Hello medical experts....the above article will soon be deleted. Is there anything worth improving here, or should we let it go? —Anne Delong (talk) 22:31, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

I say let it go. entirely promotional. -- [ UseTheCommandLine ~/talk ]# ▄ 22:38, 2 October 2013 (UTC)
Agreed. — DroEsperanto (talk) 13:11, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
Okay, it's gone. —Anne Delong (talk) 02:43, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

Our goals, helping others

I think one of our goals should be to be helpful to each other. This might sound silly, but I notice that at Wikipedia:Peer review/Cancer and nausea/archive1 there are no "regulars" who have commented. I think we should make an explicit goal on our front page to help each other when we submit articles for peer review. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 14:36, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

Perhaps a general recommendation or request rather than a "goal". Regarding peer reviews, editors are welcome to post a request for such a review on this talk page. I don't think that this was explicitly done here. (There was a mention of the article on 3rd September.) I am happy to undertake peer reviews and FAC reviews if people ask me. I no longer undertake GA reviews due to technical issues with the GAN pages. By the way, I would regard Casliber as a "regular". Axl ¤ [Talk] 15:01, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
Thanks. Yes I think a paragraph deserves to be written on how to be a good WikiProject Medicine "citizen". Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 20:27, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

Representing Social, Economic, and Public Health Aspects of Diseases

I'm a professor who teaches using Wikipedia regularly on courses relating to poverty, economic development and justice. Many of my students are interested in contributing to Wikipedia on the social and policy aspects of public health issues. (User JPoles is one my students.) It appears that most of the health and disease topics represented on Wikipedia focus on diseases and treatments at an individual or even at a pathological level. Although epidemiological aspects are often included, such information generally does not reflect the broader literatures that look at economic and social interactions and policies relating to health and well-being. Public health and social aspects are generally badly represented in Wikipedia so far as I can tell ~ even the page on Public Health is only a C class article. I do not see a clear organization for raising the social and public health aspects of specific diseases beyond an epidemiological tag on. An extensive public health and economic development literature shows that poverty and lack of access to clean water, general health care, etc. contribute to the likelihood of getting sick in the case of many such illness, often through the related adverse impact on immune systems. There are important feedbacks from such public health issues into various other non medical social issues. Public health is an important area in its own right so adding this material to articles that emphasize prevention and treatment at the individual level doesn't seem to me to be the best plan. I would suggest that the whole area of public health and related social and policy topics should become a priority for further development; perhaps another project group is a better place for this discussion, but wanted to raise it here first and would welcome everyone's thoughts on this topic. DStrassmann (talk) 01:33, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

Welcome and this is the place to bring this up. Many of our articles have sections on society and cultural aspects of disease. For example for low back pain we discuss the economics and the effects on employement Low_back_pain#Society_and_culture and the article on HIV/AIDS discusses some public health issues under HIV/AIDS#Prevention and economic ones under HIV/AIDS#Society_and_culture. Each of these sections have sub articles that than go into greater detail. Much of Wikipedia need improvement however and more could be written. We request that all contributors familiarize themselves with our referencing guideline as see here WP:MEDRS and our manual of style WP:MEDMOS. Happy to discussion further. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 01:54, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
That's a good point. In fact a lot of public health is covered under "Epidemiology of..." and "History of..." articles. For example, Epidemiology of HIV/AIDS, Prevalence of female genital mutilation by country, Female genital mutilation (GA) which is an article about a medical topic written in a non-medical style, and History of malaria (GA). For articles significant to global health, I think it's quite reasonable to have separate articles like this. LT90001 (talk) 02:11, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
DStrassmann, thank you for discussing here. For the one student whose proposal I read, and based upon MEDMOS and the discussion here, I think the logical assignment would be to start a political, social, and economic aspects of cholera article that would be summarized per WP:SS at cholera itself. That article might be a Wikipedia:Merge target for other small articles that deal with cholera, though I haven't seen a short one yet that makes me say yes, definitely merge it into a future political, social, and economic aspects of cholera article. Best regards. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 12:54, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
Join us; it's likely to get more attention if you're talking to a big group.
I think it's important to get this information summarized in the main articles. That way, people interested in it will see a prominent link to the article that details the social and cultural aspects, and also so that people who aren't interested enough to click through to the other article will have the basics right in front of them. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:17, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
Category:Health contains Category:Health economics and Category:Determinants of health and Category:Health disparities and Category:Health policy.
—Wavelength (talk) 02:00, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
Thanks to all for your helpful responses. I will pass on your thoughts to my classes. If any of you would be willing to advise specific students directly, please let me know. Here is a brief list of some of the general areas they will be working on (in addition to those referenced above relating to Diarrhea and Cholera): Right to Heath, Breastfeeding Promotion, Healthcare in Malawi,Healthcare Reform in China, Family Planning in Sub Saharan Africa, Media Portrayal of HIV/Aids, Maternal Health,Sex-selective abortion, Human Subject research (focusing on Africa). DStrassmann (talk) 16:55, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
Could I be so bold as to ask them all to publish the full text of all their proposed projects on this talk page? Thanks. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 10:08, 8 October 2013 (UTC)
Can I say, I think that is a little unreasonable. LT90001 (talk) 10:36, 8 October 2013 (UTC)
I agree that it's not really necessary. I believe the students in this class are asked to post a note on the talk page of the article they plan to work on explaining briefly the goals for their contributions to that article; so long as they respond to questions about their plans that should suffice. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 00:29, 9 October 2013 (UTC)
I read the proposal and there were startling and fundamental misunderstandings about Wikipedia that I would hope the professor would definitely learn from so that the students are given the type of guidance before they write the proposal so that they don't write such things. So I want them all published openly so that those things are corrected so that future students know what's going on on this website as well. Does that perspective make you reconsider your position a bit, LT90001 and Mike Christie? Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 20:24, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

I might be useful to get the students to read an article that is already at "good article" or "featured article" status to get an idea of how we typically format stuff before they start. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 08:05, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

File:Manhattan plot Gene C9Orf72.png

File:Manhattan plot Gene C9Orf72.png has been nominated for deletion -- 76.65.129.3 (talk) 02:11, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

It seems to be part of Stefan2/Stefan4's attempt to purge the wikis of free medical images. I am not sure how to prevent this deletion. Axl ¤ [Talk] 23:16, 8 October 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Graft versus tumor

Dear medical experts: Once again there is an article at the Afc that could use some expert attention. —Anne Delong (talk) 03:55, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

We have Graft_versus_tumor#Graft-versus-tumor_effect. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 04:32, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
Thanks for finding that, Jmh649. The current "Graft versus tumor" is a redirect to Hematopoietic stem cell transplantation which has a small section on this topic. If this article is accepted, it would replace that redirect. Do the references (and perhaps some from the current section) show enough notability to allow this topic to have its own article? Or should the submitter be encouraged instead to move relevant content to the Hematopoietic stem cell transplantation article? (I am asking because I really have no idea.) —Anne Delong (talk) 02:59, 9 October 2013 (UTC)
The topic has enough notability IMO. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 07:36, 9 October 2013 (UTC)
Okay, it's now at Graft versus tumor effect. It's just as well, since the article it was part of is very long and difficult to edit. —Anne Delong (talk) 19:47, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

Pageviews

We seem to have lost our google juices as our readership is down by half these last three months Wikipedia:WikiProject_Medicine/Popular_pages. I noticed that there is a new health box on google which features the NLM. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 04:14, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

If google is displaying alternate sources of health information over concerns of factual inaccuracies on wikipedia health articles, then I find this rather amusing: https://www.google.com/search?q=nicotine (see "Drug class: Nicotinic receptor antagonist" in the drug box) in comparison with the lead in https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Nicotine&oldid=575975639 - "It is a nicotinic acetylcholine receptor agonist."
I'll let the wrong (opposite) drug class speak for itself.Seppi333 (talk) 05:44, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
*facepalm* I suppose that most spellcheckers wouldn't recognise the word "agonist". Axl ¤ [Talk] 08:52, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
It looks like data is still coming in... Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 11:58, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

I experimented by typing in several different medical conditions into google. Not sure if this is unique to google.co.uk ... but Wikipedia's place at the first google hit has dropped to four or fifth for medical conditions. NHS choices and patient.co.uk results are now usually appearing first. I understand that google does not actually rank the search results in order of most visited, but rather they adjust the order of search results for reasons of their own. Apparently wikipedia has been demoted. I think the main reason for this is that Wikipedia articles are thought of as being too hard to understand compared with sites that are offering a simple and brief summary that is directed specifically at patients. Since patients are not supposed to be our specific target audience, I suppose we do not really have the right to complain about this. Other websites are just more user-friendly for patients perhaps? Or maybe the order of search results has not really changed and it is my imagination. Didn't wikipedia usually come up first for pretty much any medical topic?

Would be interesting to get some kind of statement from them about this, but I tried for about 10 minutes to find a way to contact google and failed. Lesion (talk) 13:54, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

Patients are not our specific audience, but we should still have a simple summary at the top of our articles—one that is accessible to average teenaged students, not just the honors class or pre-med university students. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:21, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
Agree. I was speculating on what people might think about medical content on wikipedia compared to other sites. Per Looie's comment below, this is probably not the reason for reduced pageviews. Lesion (talk) 20:44, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
  • I haven't particularly been following this, but apparently the story is that the drop is actually spurious. What has happened is that due to technical changes a lot of page views now come via the secure server (https protocol), and those are not tracked by the page view stats. There was a good bit of discussion of this on Jimbo's talk page a couple of months ago. I'm not guaranteeing that I have this straight; as I said, I wasn't paying close attention. Looie496 (talk) 16:40, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
Interesting. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 20:32, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
The data does not look as bad as it did initially. Just down maybe 25% [9]. We truly need to push to simplify the leads of our articles. I do not mind the body of the text staying more complicated but as SMS goes live we should strive to have our content useful in that format (it will be the first few sentences). Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 08:26, 8 October 2013 (UTC)
@Lesion:, I have also noticed a marked change in Google Search lately. Wikipedia articles, not only medical ones, used to show up at the top of the first page of results, but not anymore. Some Wikipedia articles no longer find their way to the first page of search results at all. Maybe this is an explanation? XOttawahitech (talk) 23:30, 8 October 2013 (UTC)


Moving two nav pages to history

These two pages should be marked as historical:

  • Pages needing attention
  • Medicine articles needing expert attention

Their function is duplicated in the 'cleanup listing', which is also more comprehensive and up-to-date. Also this would help clean up the nav bar.

  • Also, we already have an 'Editor outreach' so both functions of the expert attention page (field queries; list marked pages) are already duplicated.

Opinions? If so, I'm not quite sure how to go about marking a page in a Wikiproject as historical, so would value some help. LT90001 (talk) 08:19, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

I haven't had time to look in depth, but I hate those "historical" templates. I'd prefer one just remove any incoming links that one can and then redirect traffic to a better place. =) Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 14:24, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
I like the idea of redirecting the pages. I'm also becoming more sympathetic to killing the "expert attention" template altogether. The requests are almost never clear enough to be useful, and nobody seems to respond to them anyway. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:03, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
I've reordered the 'cleanup' page to provide a link to the expert attention category (which is a category so can't be redirected), redirected the pages needing attention to the cleanup page (page hasn't been edited recently and is duplicated), removed the link to 'top importance' cleanup (as this was last edited in 2010 and presumably the bot is dead) and for good measure alphabetised the list to make it easier to read. I hope this is satisfactory and improves the overall usefullness and ease-of-use of the interface. LT90001 (talk) 10:21, 8 October 2013 (UTC)

Welcoming new members

As our project page has been getting more hits lately, I figure now is as good of a time as any to say this. There was a recent person who signed up on our list as a member. I noticed they hadn't ever received a talk page message. They should receive a personalized one, in my opinion. We should make that a priority. And we should codify that on our front page. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 14:23, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

{{subst:MedWelcome}} points people to useful pages like MEDRS and MEDMOS. Since I usually welcome people because of their article edits, I usually add a sentence about that as well. What we need, though, isn't another "rule", but someone to actually do it. We had two or three people doing that for a while, but perhaps they're busy with other things now. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:05, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
Sometimes I feel like we come on too strong and this is as bad as biting ... I'll use this template now, it's easier than writing out one or two sentences like I would normally. Btw I tweaked the wording of this template earlier today, no major changes just made it a bit more measured. Still not happy with it, but see what others think. I know this template is based heavily on the TW one, but these welcome messages come across a bit intense I think.
  • Consider also taking out the second "welcome" and the exclamation marks.
  • Consider removing "an essay from PLoS"
  • Consider removing "general advice" and "general style guide" (MEDRS and MEDMOS both conspicuously link to said pages at the top.
  • Again consider removing wikilinks in text "Welcome" and "your contributions". Too many hyperlinks, won't know what to click. Keep as few as possible imo.
  • What about integrating the sentence about WPMED into the first line? Like "Welcome user:WhatamIdoing, from WikiProject Medicine (sign up here or say hello here)." Below I post the welcome template as it is currently, and below that a slightly tighter version to have a look at. Lesion (talk) 23:18, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
==Welcome to Wikipedia from the Medicine WikiProject!==
Welcome to Wikipedia and WikiProject Medicine

Welcome to Wikipedia from WikiProject Medicine (also known as WPMED).

We're a group of editors who strive to improve the quality of medical articles here on Wikipedia. I noticed that you are interested in editing medical articles; it's great to have a new editor on board. In your wiki-voyages, a few things that may be relevant to editing Wikipedia articles are:

  • Thanks for coming aboard! We always appreciate a new editor. Feel free to leave us a message at any time on our talk page. If you are interested in joining the project yourself, there is a participant list where you can sign up. Please leave a message on the WPMED talk page if you have any problems, suggestions, would like review of an article, need suggestions for articles to edit, or would like some collaboration when editing!
  • Sourcing of medical and health-related content on Wikipedia is guided by our medical sourcing guidelines, commonly referred to as MEDRS. These guidelines typically require recent secondary sources to support information; their application is further explained here. Primary sources (case studies, case reports, research studies) are rarely used, especially if the primary sources are produced by the organisation or individual who is promoting a claim.
  • The Wikipedia community includes a wide variety of editors with different interests, skills, and knowledge. We all manage to get along through a lot of discussion that happens under the scenes and through the bold, revert, discuss editing cycle. If you encounter any problems, you can discuss them on an article's talk page or post a message on the WPMED talk page.

Feel free to drop a note on my talk page if you have any questions. I wish you all the best on your wiki voyages! 

==Welcome==

Hello, example user, and welcome to Wikipedia from WikiProject Medicine. Thank you for your contributions. If you are interested in improving medicine-related articles, you may want to sign up to the WikiProject here or say hello here. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are some pages that you might find helpful:

I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian. Please sign your messages on discussion pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically insert your username and the date. If you need help, try Wikipedia:Questions, ask me on my talk page, or ask on the project talk page, or type your question on your talk page and then type {{helpme}} before the question.

Yes more people taking on this welcoming rolls would be great. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 23:41, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

Edit of Human Nutrition Planned

I plan on providing an extensive edit of Human Nutrition, mostly comprised of adding content rather than deleting content. This contribution will be part of a class assignment. My contribution will present information on the health consequences for malnutrition not yet mentioned in the page including dysentery, susceptibility to infectious disease, obesity, and long-term non-infectious disease complications. This contribution will be set within the context of the social aspect of understanding malnutrition amongst human populations This will entail providing not only operational definitions of malnutrition and under-nutrition, but also providing the context that produces poor nutrition, including environmental factors and social determinants. My article will also discuss nutrition programs in the United States and programming aimed at rectifying disparities in access to nutritious meals and other social determinants that cause inequalities. This contribution aims to rigorously analyze all the different perspectives of malnutrition and inaccessibility of foods by including sections pertaining to: nutrition education, obesity, poverty and food insecurity, minority populations, rural populations, special needs populations, and the lifetime benefits of these provisions. I will draw from academic sources including academic journals accessible through my Rice University access, as well as government and NGO reports. I hope my contribution will improve the article by providing a different context for information about human nutrition and malnutrition. Also, I will be including primarily secondary and tertiary sources, as opposed to the primary sources over-represented in the article, helping it gain better status in the WP:Medicine. Please provide any feedback you would like or ask any questions about my more specific approach to editing and restructuring the article either here, on my userpage, or on the talk page of Human Nutrition. I am interested in helping this article reach better class status, as well as help differentiate it from the Nutrition article. Lbockhorn (talk) 04:36, 8 October 2013 (UTC)

Welcome, Lauren. This sounds great. I'm interested in how US programs compare to other places, so if you have an opportunity to add a bit of non-US information, I think that would improve the article. Even a general statement about the unavailability of nutrition programs in some parts of the world might help provide a global context. Good luck, WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:37, 8 October 2013 (UTC)
Lauren, what about researching, re-writing, and condensing the existing content? The size is already 82kB of prose and per WP:Length that's already "too long", so to speak. Will your professor, User:DStrassmann, give you credit for such work? Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 19:03, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

Toxoplasmosis and Crazy cat lady syndrome

I think these two titles say enough. Should the latter should be part of the former? Request comments here, on the Toxoplasmosis talk page LT90001 (talk) 10:58, 8 October 2013 (UTC)

yes belongs in the society and culture section Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 10:57, 8 October 2013 (UTC)
The term is "coined by news organizations to describe scientific findings that link Toxoplasmosis to several mental disorders and behavioral problems". There is already a subsection of Toxoplasmosis#Signs and symptoms called "crazy cat lady syndrome". Whilst I agree with you that merge to Toxoplasmosis is appropriate, I think all mention of "crazy cat lady syndrome" should be in the society and culture section. Not to say the content about the possible links with mental disorders should go into society and culture. There is no "pathophysiology" section, in the article, and perhaps one is needed? Some of the sources are Media sources, and others are medical publications, some of which are primary sources. It's not a simple merge I fear... Lesion (talk) 11:08, 8 October 2013 (UTC)
Yes, I must say I quite agree. LT90001 (talk) 12:27, 8 October 2013 (UTC)
I have completed this merge. LT90001 (talk) 03:07, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

Hyperthermia-Disambiguation

Hyperthermia is the morbid elevation of body temperature. Hyperthermia is also the artificial elevation of body temperature for medical purposes, among others for boosting the immune system and as a complementary anticancer treatment modality [1]. In this context, hyperthermia is subdivided to: Whole body hyperthermia, loco-regional hyperthermia, intra-operative hyperthermia. Loco-regional hyperthermia is further subdivided to superficial and deep hyperthermia. Whole body hyperthermia is subdivided to mild, moderate and extreme hyperthermia. Modern WBH (whole body hyperthermia) is generally based in heating the body externally, while at the same time preventing the heat from escaping to the environment. Heating is generally achieved by water-filtered infra-red light; other, more conventional means are also applicable[2]. The biological result is equivalent to monitored, artificial fever. The technology needed is rather simple, but the medical aspects are rather complicated. Loco-regional hyperthermia on the other hand is technologically more involved, but medically very simple. The only technologically tricky point is to measure the temperature within the target tissue. Modern loco-regional hyperthermia is achieved by emission of a radio-frequency of 13.56 Mhz between two electrodes. The elevation of temperature within malignant tumors is achieved by condensation of the electromagnetic field, due to altered electrochemical properties of tumorous tissues. For this reason, this particular technology is referred to by use of the term oncothermia, instead of hypethermia [3]. Aias-Theodoros Papastavrou, MD, PhD — Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.130.113.2 (talk) 18:48, 8 October 2013 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperthermia_therapy
  2. ^ http://www.heckel-medizintechnik.de/en/hyperthermia/products.shtml
  3. ^ http://www.oncotherm.com/web/
Thank you for your suggestion. When you believe an article needs improvement, please feel free to make those changes. Wikipedia is a wiki, so anyone can edit almost any article by simply following the edit this page link at the top.
The Wikipedia community encourages you to be bold in updating pages. Don't worry too much about making honest mistakes—they're likely to be found and corrected quickly. If you're not sure how editing works, check out how to edit a page, or use the sandbox to try out your editing skills. New contributors are always welcome. You don't even need to log in (although there are many reasons why you might want to). WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:35, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

"Society and Culture" Cholera Section, Effective Cholera Vaccines

I would like to add a “society and culture” section to the existing Cholera article for a class. This section will include information about the role governments play on the prevention and spread of cholera, and other socio-economic factors that influence its spread. I think it is important to make these connections because if cholera spreads, there are serious economic and social political repercussions for the country. Governments also play an important role in preventing/ helping cholera spread, an important connection that is not always made. As the current Wikipedia article on “Cholera” notes, the disease is pretty much under control in developed nations. However, it is still a huge issue in developing countries. This is a highly relevant topic, since cholera prevention in developed countries shows it can be stopped, but recent outbreaks in poorer countries show that it is still occurring, when it does not need to be. The amounts of cholera outbreaks have actually risen in some countries-like Haiti- over the past few years. This makes exploring its spread a highly relevant topic. Does anyone have thoughts about creating a “society and culture” section? In this section, I will summarize a lot of existing Wikipedia articles related to cholera, like “Cholera Outbreaks and Epidemics,” “Cholera Vaccine,” “Zimbabwean Cholera Outbreak,” and “2010-13 Haiti Cholera Outbreak.” What other topics do you think should be covered in a “society and culture” section on Wikipedia? Are there specific vaccines or treatments that have been particularly effective at preventing Cholera? Are there some vaccines that are still being used, but are actually not very effective?

Kimmyfromtexas (talk) 21:47, 8 October 2013 (UTC)

(copied from talk:Participants) LT90001 (talk) 22:02, 8 October 2013 (UTC)

Thanks Kimmyfromtexas. See here if you haven't already. So in case you're going to write a long section, it could be its own article. How many paragraphs do you plan on writing? I like your plan (I think I helped with it since I read your proposal ;-). Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 22:10, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

Requesting a second opinion on my content citations

Hi everyone. I'm requesting a second opinion of my content citations from Amphetamine#Performance-enhancing in a thread on the RS noticeboard. Since it requiresWP:MEDRS, I figured it'd be a good idea to mention the request thread here to get some input from wp:med.

For context, concerns about material in a section like this on a similar page were raised a few months ago.

Regards, Seppi333 (talk) 22:56, 8 October 2013 (UTC)

Also, in the event anyone is interested, there's a WP:peer review open for comments on the article, located here. Any feedback for improvements there would be appreciated. Seppi333 (talk) 02:38, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

Hospital gown

It would be very helpful if someone with some (any) hospital experience could go over to Hospital gown and remove garbage. At the moment, it's long on sexual side effects and the only style of hospital gown in existence is the style favored for comedy shows. I don't want to speak for the whole world, but I'm pretty sure that my local hospital doesn't require patients to lie in bed with no underwear and open gowns, and I'm even pretty sure that they've discovered this invention called "pants". But I don't know just how much of it is junk, so I'd rather let someone else have a go at it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:07, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

About 50% of that article is not really encyclopedic and unreferenced to boot. I don't like the image either. If no-one has any objections I am happy to trim it down to sourced content and tweak the language used. In my limited experience, for surgical inpatients, underwear would stay on under the gown unless it would be near the operating field or if the patient was going to have a urinary catheter placed before the operation begins (e.g. for a long procedure). Most non-surgical inpatients would be told they could keep underwear on I would say, unless there is some specific reason not to, if they are waiting for some examination or investigation which underwear would interfere with. Then again hospital policy is sure to vary around the world, from one district to the next, and even from one department to the next. Lesion (talk) 11:03, 9 October 2013 (UTC)
 Done

Edits for Female Infertility

I'm looking to add information for the society and culture section of Female infertility. If you have any questions, comments, or concerns, contact me on my talk page. AllyBremer (talk) 02:13, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

Hi AllyBremer, and welcome.
There are a lot of books about the emotional effects of infertility. Were you looking for something like that? Or were you more interested in various culture-level effects, like this African idea that childless couples deserve less political voice? WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:02, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

Goals

Restated. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 20:19, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

See the recent one directed towards me (Brian) from User:AlexLee90 at the bottom of Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Neuroscience#Need_a_topic.3F_Unsure_about_one.3F_Think_you.27re_sure.2C_but_you_want_to_double_check.3F_Ask_below. Does anyone want to take it? I'm about done for the day, and I'll be travelling tomorrow. I will also be meeting with the professor on Thursday, his TA's, and a librarian to work on the course design so that students get clearer instruction in 2014. So it's not that I'm lazy. =) Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 21:45, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

RFA notification

Some people here might be interested in Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Zad68. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:00, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Who's that? ;-) Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 08:43, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
WhatamIdoing, you have not have posted that. It falls foul of WP:CANVAS. (It's not as though Zad68 needs extra support to pass.) Axl ¤ [Talk] 19:12, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
If a single, neutrally worded sentence, posted for a large and diverse audience of people who are likely more familiar with an RFA candidate than any other group on Wikipedia (the best and the worst), somehow falls afoul of CANVAS, then that alleged rule needs to be written down somewhere. If you go look at CANVAS, I think you'll find that this note meets all of the criteria: limited, neutral, non-partisan, and open. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:11, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
I'm with Biosthmors, I have no idea who this is. Lesion (talk) 22:18, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
This is certainly not a non-partisan audience, especially when you characterise him as "one of ours". Axl ¤ [Talk] 22:20, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
Describing an editor as "one of ours", when inviting others to participate in a discussion about that editor, is really not helpful. It's natural for humans to think in terms of groups (and group loyalty) but we should treat editors as individuals, on their own merits. Sorry. This isn't intended as a slur against Zad68, who I'm sure is a fine upstanding editor. bobrayner (talk) 22:38, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
I re-factored the title to be more neutral. Lesion (talk) 22:40, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
To counteract your concerns, bobrayner and Axl, I'd say I'm giving Zad a good little grilling. Also ping to Doc James as it was an edit of yours that is prompting this discussion. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 16:38, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

You mean this edit [10]? We have secondary sources dealing with the question of safety. No need to use a primary case controlled study. This design does not prove that the risks are "identical". There are simply to many confounders in the study [11]. Just because other primary sources are within an article is not justification to add more. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 17:37, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

Yes that edit. To be honest, I think it was arbitrary and bitey, so that's why I reverted it and tagged the article with {{medref}}. If we have a new person improving Wikipedia content we shouldn't revert them because it's not perfect. In fact, we should WP:PRESERVE when we can. And the edit summary there is factually incorrect per WP:MEDREV because MEDRS allows the use of primary sources.
Let's consider another scenario. What if we had a nice paragraph with content from secondary sources but then we had an edit that incorporated good content from a primary source but could be converted to a secondary one, by simply changing the reference? In that case then we have perfect example of why we might use {{npsn}}. It would be horrible to revert that contribution. I feel like we should have some essay about this, or maybe a section somewhere. I'm afraid "secondary"/"MEDRS" mis-application chases away potential new editors. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 17:54, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
Biosthmors, your "grilling" certainly does not counteract my concerns. Indeed it exemplifies one of the problems of RfA—pointless questions that waste the candidate's time. Axl ¤ [Talk] 20:16, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
Should we, as WikiProject Medicine editors, use factually inaccurate edit summaries, generally speaking? When should we revert and when should we not? Perhaps it is a better discussion for here, but I think you'll forgive me since it's my first foray into the venue over there. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 20:56, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
We should not be determining our policy around primary versus secondary sources at someone RfA nomination. If you want to alter the MEDRS policy please bring the discussion there.
For example just reverted [12] with the summary that we need a proper secondary source. Primary sources and especially newspaper are often over promotional.
This review states "in our view the QEEG variables are artifact-prone and biologically unspecific" [13]. We must be careful not to promote excess treatment or diagnosis. FDA approval does not mean it has a general role in the diagnosis of ADHD or that all kids with ADHD need one. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 21:14, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
Thanks for your edits. In my opinion, there's nothing I've said that suggests I want to change MEDRS. Most of the time we don't want primary sources, I agree, but to revert and say "secondary sources required" would (at least some of the time) be factually inaccurate per WP:MEDREV. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 21:38, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
Ah okay yes. Will I agree there is room for the occasional usage of primary sources I do not consider this source to be it. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 22:23, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
To clarify, by "this" do you mean Cassidy 2008, or were you talking about the ADHD one? Thanks. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 22:07, 6 October 2013 (UTC)

I mean Cassidy. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 22:11, 6 October 2013 (UTC)

  • Biosthmors I think I see two points you'd like addressed, one about the edit summaries, and one about how to respond to edits based on primary sources when the article already has so many primary sources in it, what's the difference--why revert it if it will avoid a "bite"?

    Regarding edit summaries, things like "secondary sources are required" or "all we do is summarize secondary sources" aren't technically correct, as WP:MEDRS does allow for the use of primary sources in certain situations. In the future, where needed I will change my edit summaries to something like "secondary sources should be used if available" or "please use secondary sources".

    Regarding primary sources added in a situation like the addition of Cassidy 2008 to Spinal manipulation, I see your point: if the article section is already poor and has orphaned primary sources in it, what's the harm in letting another one get added to avoid having a new editor feel bitten? Personally, I see this situation as the right time to introduce a new editor to the importance of secondary sources. In this particular case, after the Bold edit and Doc's Revert, there was a really great Discussion here between yourself, Doc James and the editor, and the editor was very welcoming of the pointer to WP:MEDRS, the explanation of the importance of secondary sources, and the help and advice they were receiving--all with the edit removed from the article (before it was restored). I think that's exactly the way it should work. The existence of poorly-used primary sources isn't justification for allowing the addition of more. Our article content shouldn't be allowed to get worse because we're welcoming or teaching new editors, and the discussion pointed to above shows that we don't have to. Doing so would be putting editors ahead of our content and readers, and I don't agree with that ordering of priorities. Zad68 15:17, 8 October 2013 (UTC)

I saw the addition of Cassidy 2008 as an improvement to the paragraph, which is why I reverted. As mentioned at the RfA it had other problems, but let's try to imagine it from a newcomer's perspective. If we have a scenario in which we have old primary literature cited already, and someone comes along and adds newer primary literature, they are only responding the the paragraph's structure. Wouldn't reverting their new primary source addition without altering the old primary source paragraph be arbitrary and only based on the fact that it was a new edit? Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 16:04, 8 October 2013 (UTC)
Biosthmors, I can only point to what I wrote already. In this scenario, the best thing to do would be to have a discussion with the new editor about the current poor state of the article and what needs to be done to improve it. Allowing the edit to stand not only worsens the article (in my view), but also teaches the new editor something wrong about our sourcing guidelines. As a result the article edited isn't improved and the new editor leaves with an incorrect understanding of sourcing, and will probably go make the same kind of edit somewhere else. As it turns out, after that discussion ended with the added primary source in place, the editor went on to make this edit adding a primary source, and used inappropriately. Maybe if the importance of secondary or tertiary sources were emphasized in the original discussion, the editor would have used this review article and/or this textbook instead? When the edit happens would be the best possible time to have that discussion, just like you and Doc had with the editor. Zad68 02:33, 10 October 2013 (UTC)
Just because previous poor quality content / refs exist does not mean we should add more. We need to emphasis the importance of secondary sources when they exist. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 13:10, 10 October 2013 (UTC)
I agree. But why should we revert newbies who do? How is it not arbitrary and unwelcoming, if they are adding better primary sources? Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 17:31, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

Cleanup goal?

I think this calls attention to the importance of the issue that was just fixed with gastrointestinal cancer. The fewer embarrassments we have floating around the website the more likely we are to be the default choice of google (if that has influenced our page-view stats). We currently have over 19,000 issues identified in our ~28,000 articles. We should make it an explicit goal to reduce this count every month. How about we make a time in the future at which we hope to have these issues down by? How about by 1 Jan 2015 we shoot to have only 8,000 issues identified, for example? Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 09:34, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

I do not find the cleanup tags the most useful. Any article that is not a GA/FA needs work and that means more than 99% of them. A number of GAs/FAs are in need of a good updating. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 23:43, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
I agree with everything you said. But sometimes the cleanup tags make good points, and I encourage them to be applied wisely. These "good tags", I might call them, are an inventory that contain valuable information.
If we can legitimately get the total number of them down to 8,000, then we will made good progress, because they are essentially serving as Wikipedia-allowed "negative advertisements". Also, if we can get them down to 8,000, then the ones that remain will likely increase in their usefulness. Maybe 70% of tags are deserved right now, to throw out a number, for discussion's sake. But if we can reduce the number of total tags to a number of 8,000, then we might also make the 8,000 that remain 85% deserved. And in that process, we might generate 1000 new tags that are 95% deserved. All that would be tremendously helpful for our project and our public image, in my opinion. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 10:05, 8 October 2013 (UTC)
Hello, that is certainly a noble aspiration. I've been looking at the listings a lot over the past few months in order to try and winnow down the things which need winnowing. In my opinion if there was a way to view by date that would be useful, but as it is there are only a few categories (merge, split, copyright flaws) that are small enough to deal with. Moreover, having looked at the list, you end up with about 50% of the tagged pages being ones that are either in dispute, or 'difficult' pages that require significant editing to remove the tag (eg to complete a merge with reasonable quality, or integrated an orphan). Lastly, you could end up wasting your time fixing up articles with an aggregate view of 1 per month, which is probably a bot, by fixing orphans and what not, but could help tens to hundreds of thousands of viewers by providing good-quality articles on the top 1500 list. I think that what you're proposing is a very reasonable and noble aspiration but that having been looking over myself and working through merges and orphans I think about 95% of the time spent on such an endeavor is completely wasted. LT90001 (talk) 10:34, 8 October 2013 (UTC)
On the other hand one possible way we could do this is what you have previously proposed, which is to have a specific "clean-up" drive once a quarter (once a month might be a little unachievable), and select a specific criteria, eg merges, orphans or what not, and work through that. I'd be in full support of such an undertaking, which with our many hands should be light work. LT90001 (talk) 10:34, 8 October 2013 (UTC)
By the way, I think performing mergers that need merging is quite noble work. It's essentially "classifying" articles in article space, so to speak. This has much more impact than going behind the scenes and making sure everything classified as "mid" importance is truly "mid" importance, in my opinion. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 08:21, 9 October 2013 (UTC)
Thanks. Actually, one of the reasons this project has such an active back-end is because of the users (WhatamIdoing, for example) who tirelessly work to classify articles by importance and class. This allows us to not only focus our efforts, but is also very useful when proposing and resolving merges and so forth, because you immediately get a good idea of where an article stands. So, more important than it seems at first blush. LT90001 (talk) 01:36, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

Venomous spiders

Are species pages about venoumous spiders, such as the black widow spider and the redback spider, within the scope of WP Medicine. If so, I will add WP banners to the talk pages. Snowman (talk) 08:59, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

No. The specific topics that relate to WP:Med are Latrodectism (and latrotoxin) and articles directly relating to disease states. However, although they are not covered under Wikimed, we still promote the use of evidence as described by WP:MEDRS. edited to include sig and fix spelling error LT90001 (talk) 09:04, 9 October 2013 (UTC)
Thank you. That is clear. Snowman (talk) 09:12, 9 October 2013 (UTC)
I agree—venomous spiders are not within the scope of this WikiProject. Axl ¤ [Talk] 13:52, 9 October 2013 (UTC)
As shown above, the health issues that venomous spiders may cause are within this project's scope. Not everything within this project's scope is tagged as such; topics that mostly aren't medical, but have some medical aspects, usually aren't tagged as being within this project's scope. However, this is the obvious place to query help for medical aspects of those topics. So there is like a division of "directly related" and "indirectly related." The Latrodectism and Latrotoxin articles are currently tagged as being within this WikiProject's scope, by the way. LT910001's assessed both articles on September 30th, as seen here and here. Flyer22 (talk) 14:27, 9 October 2013 (UTC)
The redback spider is currently at FAC, so if anyone from the WikiProject Med would like to have a look at the medical content on the species page, then fine. Snowman (talk) 11:40, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

They don't have to get through the process by the end of the month, but given Wikipedia:WikiProject Medicine/UCSF Elective 2013, I think we have a good shot. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 19:22, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

Helping these articles should be our December collaboration of the month (especially after the students are "done" with their assignment requirements) but hopefully they'll stick around at least a little. =) Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 20:06, 9 October 2013 (UTC)
Biosthmors, I would independently do 2-3 a month on wpmed articles I'm interested in, but unfortunately certain WP processes are painfully slow; although, other ones seem a little faster. Unfortunately, I don't have the attention span to do more than one at a time. :) Seppi333 (talk) 04:30, 11 October 2013 (UTC)
Hah, yes, having noted that, I have been trying to work through the GA reviews, however I don't know enough about Amphetamines to tackle this one. Peer review, on the other hand, is a lot less tasking. LT90001 (talk) 12:46, 11 October 2013 (UTC)
No worries - I appreciate your feedback! Seppi333 (talk) 17:52, 11 October 2013 (UTC)

Reliable source?

There are numerous articles with citations to the Journal of Bodywork and Movement Therapies. While it is pubmed indexed, it seems (to me, at least) to be largely dedicated to CAM methodologies. Views on its reliability would be welcome. LeadSongDog come howl! 02:58, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

If they are primary sources would generally remove them. If secondary sources would need to consider if there was anything better. Home page of journal is here [14] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 00:05, 11 October 2013 (UTC)
I can't judge reliability of the content, but it is indexed in Medline/Index Medicus, Scopus, and Cochrane Center, as shown here. That would make the journal notable per WP:NJournals and Medline indexing is a good sign per WP:MEDRS. --Mark viking (talk) 00:35, 11 October 2013 (UTC)
Thanks, but Elsevier's credibility is rather damaged these days. In any case, I don't see any sign of even them claiming an established Impact factor. Then too, it's being used in trainwrecks such as Reflexive_antagonism. LeadSongDog come howl! 05:13, 11 October 2013 (UTC)

Student editors

I have moved the 'classes editing' to our 'departments' page for prominence. Might I suggest:

  • Developing and posting on that page a 5-step curriculum so that poor biosthmors and other interested editors have a standardised and evolving way to educate students. For example:
    • Step 1: create account
    • Step 2: introduction to guidelines on wikipedia
    • Step 3: introduction to reliable sources
    • Step 4: how to create articles, selecting an appropriate title or place for edits
    • Step 5: encouragement to be bold, position statement.
  • Development of a tag to be appended to talk pages so that the aggregated edits on student-related talk pages can be easily tracked.
  • A wikiproject statement that outlines our position towards student editors (particularly those in editing classes). This may include:
    • Acknowledgement of student editors as valuable contributors who may or may not have a permanent prescence after the project is done
    • Respect for the autonomy of student editors.
    • Encouragement to be bold (within reason)
    • Acknowledgement that student editors may not be as aware of guidelines as other editors, but this doesn't detract from the quality of their contributions
    • Encouragement of feedback given to be clear and concise without excessive use of guidelines.

Example:

Wikiproject medicine acknowledges the valuable contributions that can be provided by our student editors. We respect the autonomy of these editors to make edits as any other users. We recognise that these editors may not be familiar with guidelines and may only have a temporary presence on Wikipedia, and thus encourage existing users to be positive, clear and concise in their feedback to this group of new users. We encourage these users to make bold, but well thought-out and well-sourced edits, and recognise that students have the potential to make lasting, high-quality edits.

This would have the additional benefit of standardising and clarifying our current stance. Kind regards, LT90001 (talk) 09:15, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

Medicine in 2013

Hello all, I am planning to create the article Medicine in 2013 as a list article that refers in chronological order to significant events in Medicine in the year 2013. I think this list should include: significant changes in international guidelines; significant retractions; significant prizes awarded; significant deaths; outbreaks; first uses of experimental technology; acquisitions of medicine-related companies > $1 billion; NGO work, and so on. I think it is useful and would be very interesting to have this almanac. I would value feedback and any suggestions for significant medical events this year. So far this would include:

  • Release of DSM-5
  • PPACA
  • Transition from an involuntary to a voluntary organ-donation system in China

I would love to hear suggestions from other users as to significant medical events this year so I can start working on a draft. If possible I would like to use the principle of WP:Affirmative voting, and request submissions rather than criticism of existing submissions.

Kind regards, LT90001 (talk) 09:15, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

The article can be categorized with similar articles for other years in Category:Medicine by year [red link now] or in Category:Years in medicine [red link now], which can be categorized in Category:History of medicine and in Category:Years by topic.
—Wavelength (talk) 16:17, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

2012

2012 (I may also create this list... also there may be some confusion as to 2013/12 so I'll put this here) LT90001 (talk) 09:15, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

  • Aquisition of company for Sofosbuvir, novel treatment for Hep B: [15]
  • New mental health laws in China
  • One year without polio in India

Update: I have created the article Medicine in the 2010s and would value any feedback about significant events missed. LT90001 (talk) 08:06, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

Two ideas: gene therapy milestone with the European approval of Glybera in 2012, and introduction of the first renal denervation device in 2010. --WS (talk) 15:11, 16 October 2013 (UTC)

More news about us

[16] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 15:20, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

Thank you for pointing it out. It is also particularly good to see a free picture from Wikimedia Commons used with the correct attribution. Axl ¤ [Talk] 18:41, 10 October 2013 (UTC)
I have also added this article to a new WikiProject Medicine - Press & Publications page, which attempts to record mentions of Medicine-related content in Wikipedia in the media. LT90001 (talk) 01:12, 11 October 2013 (UTC)
@LT910001: good initiative. I wonder if it would be good idea to add a tab for this page on Wikipedia:WikiProject_Medicine to let others know about it? XOttawahitech (talk) 18:58, 11 October 2013 (UTC)

disseminated intravascular coagulopathy

I have made some edits to the article on disseminated intravascular coagulopathy. But, as I don't really know what I'm talking about, please review my edits and revert them if necessary. 74.96.75.230 (talk) 04:31, 11 October 2013 (UTC)

There was already a separate line for viruses. I have fixed this. The rest is fine. Thank you for your edits. Axl ¤ [Talk] 08:19, 11 October 2013 (UTC)

Feedback on WPMED tab navigation

Tab navigation for WPMED was suggested by Biosthmors, and I think it's a great idea to improve navigation between major project pages, so I made an illustrative mock up of what these tabs could be like (see top of page). I added the tabs pretty randomly and I am sure it is not the best selection. Please see template:WikiProject Medicine Tabs if you wish to make any changes to the number or selection of tabs (it's a really easy template to work with), or leave a message below if you prefer. Importantly, what project pages do people use most often, and what would be convenient to have in the tabs?

I am also working on changing the look of template:MedTalkheader (here is a work in progress: template:MedTalkheader#Mock up- need to add archiving). There is no real reason to change the template other than to make it fit with the new right hand WPMED nav template and tabs. Lesion (talk) 11:10, 11 October 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for doing these edits, the new interface looks fantastic! I think the current header is very good and includes the major focuses. LT90001 (talk) 01:36, 12 October 2013 (UTC)
One small thing (pun unintended) is that the image for 'wikipedia medicine' is too big for my screen. LT90001 (talk) 01:39, 12 October 2013 (UTC)
I was worried about how these would look on various sized screens. I have reduced the width of the image in both Template:MedTalkheader and Template:WikiProject Medicine Header. If this is still too wide, please let me know, or alternatively tweak the size manually. It is the first line of both templates: File:WikiMEDBanner.svg|center|700px|link= Thanks for highlighting this. Lesion (talk) 01:52, 12 October 2013 (UTC)


Fresh look, it looks better, so thank you, but...

I think our overall look is much crisper on the project page. Thank you Lesion. Although, I strongly oppose all the tabs at the top. I think the current seven tabs could very well harm our WikiProject by directing traffic to the wrong places. I strongly believe there is no reason we should want to throw people out to the medicine portal, COTM (WT:MED is where that discussion is focused, lately), the member list, and to featured content as first options. I want us to have an efficient page that channels productive energy, not one which disperses it as a first matter of order. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 17:23, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

Apologies, I thought you wanted tab navigation because I saw tabs in the sandbox mock up you were working on. I see you have removed them entirely, but if you were unhappy with the selection of tabs, these were just illustrative and I was awaiting feedback about which tabs people would want in the selection. If no-one wants them, no worries.
Apart from the tabs, I think the further changes you are making to the project page are great. The page is slowly heading to a more minimalist feel instead of being information overload. As I stated on you talkpage, I think the project page should be much more tight, and we should not be afraid to make it into more of a hub for navigation to sub pages. Lesion (talk) 20:35, 12 October 2013 (UTC)
What's does today is gone tomorrow! I liked the tabs, but not having them gives the project a lot more space. I feel on the main WP:Med page it would be good if the navigation were higher, to give it prominence and visibility (perhaps a small collapsible variant?). LT910001 (talk) 22:22, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

Peer reviews of fake cancer study

Many open-access journals were stung by a fake cancer study by John Bohannon.

—Wavelength (talk) 17:04, 11 October 2013 (UTC)

Yes, this is the same thing discussed above in the section #MEDRS and pay-to-play journals, Science sting. Looie496 (talk) 17:52, 11 October 2013 (UTC)
We have a huge issue with the poor quality of medical publishing generally as garbage in equals garbage out. There is 1) fake journals 2) ghost writing 3) the changing of primary endpoints after the start of trials 4) journals that accept publications with the understanding that a certain number of reprints will be ordered 5) publication bias were much of the evidence never sees the light of day 6) and fabricated results.
Much of this can only be dealt with by our governments stepping up and putting a stop to it. Some of the measures would be fairly easy. 1) All human trials need ethics approval and part of the approval should be a requirement that full data be published. If it isn't the authors / company are not allowed to carry out any future trials until it is. 2) The use of trial registries need to be enforced. If you did not use a trial registry you do not get ethics approval. The authors need to be submitted to the trial registry before the trial begins. No more finding authors after the trial is done.
What can we do at Wikiproject Med? Remain skeptical of medical claims. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 02:32, 12 October 2013 (UTC)
Thanks James, for articulating that. I'd hate to see that go to the archives to be lost. Maybe we could start a WikiProject essay which states "our opinions" on the issues. Or a "Background" section at MEDRS. I just feel like we should have a spot where we can come to a consensus on "our" views on medical information. I think it could be very helpful, and something that could be linked to from the project page. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 17:27, 12 October 2013 (UTC)
If you feel so inclined, WP:MEDRS would be an excellent place to link such an essay from. LT910001 (talk) 22:22, 12 October 2013 (UTC)


Dentistry urgent care

I was trying to find info about dentistry urgent care but the article urgent care does not mention the topic. I wanted to ask on Talk: urgent care about it, but seems that page is hardly used. Where can I locate info on wikipedia about this important topic? Thanks in advance, XOttawahitech (talk) 18:53, 11 October 2013 (UTC)


See "Dental emergency".—Wavelength (talk) 19:13, 11 October 2013 (UTC)
If only there was a way to tag these sort of threads for archiving, I don't think we can reduce the archive time any further without being unfair to our weekend users, nor can we try and use different talk pages (which will die very quickly) but this page is getting very cluttered and unwieldy. LT90001 (talk) 01:38, 12 October 2013 (UTC)
You can collapse top and bottom. Have added a redirect. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 02:44, 12 October 2013 (UTC)
Done. LT90001 (talk) 03:04, 12 October 2013 (UTC)
I've reverted it. Collapsed sections are bad for editors with disabilities, as well as for anyone trying to find something by searching the page (with ⌘ Command+F, for example)—and since collapsed sections persist in archiving, that essentially hides the material from all searchers permanently. If you want to tag an item as being resolved, try the {{resolved}} template. If you want to archive completed discussions, then just archive them manually. It only requires cutting and pasting the text. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:48, 12 October 2013 (UTC)
It appears the archive bot is down (Wikipedia:Bot_owners'_noticeboard#MiszaBots_down), so I have manually archived threads > 5 days old. LT910001 (talk) 00:52, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

Molecular Diagnostics Good Article nomination

Hi,

With help, I've brought Molecular diagnostics up to (I think) Wikipedia:GA level. So I've nominated it.

I've got a PhD in Bioinformatics, so I'm confident of the molecular biology side of the article. But if anyone with specialist knowledge would take a look at it from the medical testing side, just to check I haven't missed out anything important, that'd be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Ian McDonald (talk) 22:05, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

I have no experience judging GAC, but like the article so far. Since GA is in part about comprehensiveness, here are some suggestions for expansion. In the Development from Research Tools section, I think it is important to note that lab and lab personnel also need to be accredited in addition to just the tools--a solid LIMS, good sample tracking protocol, HIPAA compliance, etc. On the medical side, it isn't mentioned in the article, but should be, that molecular diagnostics play a central role in the burgeoning field of personalized medicine. Molecular diagnostics were the subject of a recent Supreme Court case involving Myriad Genetics and the BRCA1 tests with implications for both companies and basic research. There is also controversy about molecular diagnostics done within vs outside the clinical setting, e.g., geneticists' reactions to companies like 23andMe performing SNP assays for sort-of-diagnostic and entertainment purposes. --Mark viking (talk) 22:39, 13 October 2013 (UTC)
I've mentioned staff & system personnel, and biological patents, though agree more could be said on that.
I've mentioned it's used by personalized medicine; I do not think there's a need to go beyond that.
If it's outside the clinical settings, surely by definition it's not part of diagnostics; is there a reason why I'm wrong?
Ian McDonald (talk) 22:06, 18 October 2013 (UTC)
  • If I was doing the GA review, the first thing I would want to know is, who invented the term "molecular diagnostics", and what contexts has it been used in, in the literature? Looie496 (talk) 02:24, 14 October 2013 (UTC)
  • It's great to have such active contributors, and thanks for your attention to the article, Drianmcdonald. I agree with the above comments and suggest that you add some of these sections before the GA progresses. One or two paragraphs (eg definition of cancer, molecular diagnostic stages) are not cited, and page numbers are not provided for the citations in the book (you can use {{rp|page number}} to produce an inline page number (like this : page ). Also for lay readers it may be a good idea to expand some of the paragraphs to help lay readers understand some of the issues in the article, such as SNPs and karyotyping, and how molecular diagnostics can help you karyotype something. Does molecular biology include FISH, PCR, ELISA, and the plethora of other acronym-based testing modalities used? If so, these should definitely be included. Lastly, it is convention here for all words in titles to be in lowercase except the first. I trust you are now replete with well-meaning advice! Cheers, LT910001 (talk) 11:46, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

Wondering if I should skip GA and nominate Amphetamine for FA.

Hi everyone, over the past few months, and especially this past month, I made countless (or apparently ~200+) edits to the amphetamine article, such as removing numerous primary sources and replacing them with reviews and fleshing out several sections. Consequently, I was wondering if someone familiar with the FA review process would be willing to take a look at that article and tell me if it seems ready for an FA review or if it's worthwhile to going through the GA process first. I'm at a point where I really can't think of additional ways to make substantive content improvements.
Thanks, Seppi333 (talk) 02:28, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

I would recommend going to GA first. The value of a GA review depends on whether you have the luck of getting a good reviewer, but in the best cases a GA review is more useful -- in the sense of improving an article -- than an FA review, which can easily turn into a circus. Looie496 (talk) 02:41, 14 October 2013 (UTC)
Definitely go for GA first... even if it looks great, you'll probably have a hard time getting serious attention at FAC unless it already has that green plus on it, they pretty much expect to see it at GA before FAC. Zad68 04:13, 14 October 2013 (UTC)
Adding: Right off the top, I see the article is missing Society and culture and also History sections that honestly I would expect to be there to pass GA, much less FAC. I see you split those off to History and culture of amphetamines... you can't just split it off without having at least a paragraph or three in the main article summarizing the sub-article, per WP:SUMMARYSTYLE. Zad68 04:15, 14 October 2013 (UTC)
I was aware of that policy, but I was wondering what the general interpretation of it was before I went about including a summary section like that. In any event, I'll have a cited section of that on the page in about 30 minutes, as I'm not surprisingly very familiar with that material. Any other suggestions besides that? Seppi333 (talk) 04:42, 14 October 2013 (UTC)
Hi Seppi, if you can wait a few days until I've returned from vacation, I'd be happy to do a GA review for you. I've worked on psilocybin and have FA experience, and should be able to help give the article a shove in that direction. Sasata (talk) 05:21, 14 October 2013 (UTC)
Sure thing - thanks for offering to do it. Seppi333 (talk) 05:59, 14 October 2013 (UTC)
GA first would be best. Blue Rasberry (talk) 03:00, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

Would anyone be interested in collecting and editing topics relevant in resourceless/developing settings?

Just trying to look through clinical topics that may be relevant in a developing setting (specific to Southern Africa in my case) and edit those pages. Has anyone else already started this kind of process? Would anyone be interested in helping?Pek1987 (talk) 13:18, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

There is a whole armada of articles that can be found in Category:Health_in_South_Africa. If you have anything specific you would like to work on, leave a message on my talk page and I'd be happy to help out. LT910001 (talk) 13:21, 14 October 2013 (UTC)
There is, alas, a bit of a difference between "South Africa" and "Southern Africa". I'm interested in this from a development perspective - if you need a hand with anything, feel free to use my talkpage too. bobrayner (talk) 13:49, 14 October 2013 (UTC)
Ah yes, much can be said of not skim-reading! In this case, Category:Health in Africa is suitable, although unfortunately you will have to select the Southern countries individually. Other categories (HIV/AIDS in Africa) may also be of interest. LT910001 (talk) 08:25, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

Thank you so much for the responses. I will be surveying some hcws in the rural parts of Botswana. Once we get a more comprehensive idea of what kinds of clinical topics interest them, I can upload a list. Would you guys be interested in helping edit those specific pages to make it additionally relevant in a resource limited setting? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Pek1987 (talk • contribs) 10:40, 17 October 2013 (UTC)

AfC submission

Yet another submission. We get several of these a week. Is anyone interested in joining? Cheers, FoCuSandLeArN (talk) 15:11, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Learning Resource Server Medicine

Here's another Afc submission. —Anne Delong (talk) 19:52, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

If only these were integrated into the article alerts system... LT910001 (talk) 22:49, 14 October 2013 (UTC)
Yeah, tell me about it! Here's a rather good one: Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Heteroscorpine. FoCuSandLeArN (talk) 14:48, 15 October 2013 (UTC)


Edit war at History of HIV/AIDS

Can I please have a second opinion on the current edit war at History of HIV/AIDS? page history --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 09:42, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

Started thread on talk page. The Lancet is a reputable journal, no? It's paywalled so will need someone else to assess for MEDRS. Doesn't sound like a primary source from the abstract. If that content is kept, I think it should be merged into the above section because it is only a few sentences. Might not be as much of a sourcing issue as a due weight issue. Lesion (talk) 10:38, 15 October 2013 (UTC)
Thanks Lesion. Lancet is fine. The last revert I did was to this version that cited just two self-published sources and something from the Atlantic Monthly. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 11:25, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

Salt article

The salt is part of WP:Medicine. The article is approaching GA status. It included a section of the health effects of salt. I have tidied it up, and I would be grateful for further opinions on this section. Some of the sources seem to be too old for a WP:Medicine article. Please reply over there. Snowman (talk) 11:02, 16 October 2013 (UTC)

Specifically, Talk:Salt/GA1#Additional input regarding health effects. – Quadell (talk) 14:01, 16 October 2013 (UTC)

Frequently-updated Sources

DRUGDEX, DrugPoint, Medscape, UpToDate are excellent resources that quote reliable sources and while I realise they're updated regularly (which is not a horrible thing seeing how we're in a hopefully rapidly-evolving field) and this makes verifiability sometime tricky I still believe that while they may not be considered first-line or preferred sources, they should be deemed acceptable. A good example of their utility comes with side effects, their incidence (which gives the reader some context) and pharmacokinetic data — to quote all their (these resources) sources instead of these sources themselves would be, to say the least, tedious and a waste of time that could be better used on other parts of drug pages. Fuse809 (talk) 11:50, 16 October 2013 (UTC)

A source needs to be strong enough to support its claims. These are likely to be strong enough for some claims and not for others. We do have some editors who are especially zealous about using the best possible sources, but most of us agree that the "best" should not be the enemy of the "good enough", especially for simpler or lighter-weight claims. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:35, 16 October 2013 (UTC)

LED phototherapy for acne vulgaris

Could someone from this project take a quick look at this edit [17] to our acne vulgaris article? Is the sourcing legitimate per WP:MEDRS, and/or is it overly promotional? AndyTheGrump (talk) 16:22, 16 October 2013 (UTC)

I just reverted an identical edit in Light therapy. It seemed to be overwriting a 2009 systematic review with a bunch of lesser/older sources. Is this right? Alexbrn talk|contribs|COI 16:24, 16 October 2013 (UTC)
Oops, I'd missed that - I hadn't looked closely enough at the dates. I'll revert it. AndyTheGrump (talk) 16:28, 16 October 2013 (UTC)
I've left a welcoming note on the new editor's page and invited her to join us here. And now I need to go talk to a checkuser... WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:40, 16 October 2013 (UTC)

Eurycoma longifolia

I'd like to suggest that editors familiar with WP:MEDRS have a look at the article Eurycoma longifolia. The Biological Effects section seems to be a collection of in vitro and animal studies referenced mostly to primary sources. I know enough to think that this probably violates WP:MEDRS and is likely to give the typical reader the wrong impression about the validity and relevance of these biological effects, but I'm not sure how to deal with the content. Any help from more experienced editors would be appreciated. 173.62.242.128 (talk) 12:22, 17 October 2013 (UTC)

You're right. I've pruned the text back and added a sentence sourced to WebMD which makes things clearer. Alexbrn talk|contribs|COI 15:46, 17 October 2013 (UTC)
Thank you very much. 173.62.242.128 (talk) 01:36, 18 October 2013 (UTC)

RfC at Foreign Accent Syndrome

There is currently an open RfC at Foreign Accent Syndrome, looking for comments about what to do about the growing list of cases that has been included in the article. If there are any interested editors, we would like to invite your comments and suggestions on this matter. 0x0077BE (talk) 20:25, 17 October 2013 (UTC)


Question: Personal titles

Is there a guideline on Wikipedia that relates to how people should be described? Am reading a fair few articles that state names as "Dr. XYZ, PhD" and so forth, and not quite sure if there is a standardised way we should handle this or not. LT910001 (talk) 11:51, 18 October 2013 (UTC)

WP:CREDENTIAL Alexbrn talk|contribs|COI 11:54, 18 October 2013 (UTC)
Thanks! LT910001 (talk) 21:40, 18 October 2013 (UTC)

Lunasin

I wandered across Lunasin after being referred there by a friend. Either, this is one of the greatest things ever, or it is a bit of a puff-piece, but I'm not expert enough to know if the journals are trustworthy or not. I would appreciate someone with more knowledge than me giving it a look. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mrjeff ([[U--LT910001 (talk) 07:32, 20 October 2013 (UTC)ser talk:Mrjeff|talk]] • contribs) 17:05, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

It doesn't look like a puff piece, but there isn't enough evidence yet to say that it is a great thing. Lunasin is a polypeptide found in soybeans, with substantial evidence for anticancer activity in laboratory paradigms. Normally a polypeptide can't be ingested orally because it would be digested, but apparently soybeans also contain a Bowman–Birk protease inhibitor that protects the lunasin as it passes through the digestive system. As far as I can see there is no clinical evidence for its usefulness, and the world is full of things that work well in lab paradigms but turn out not to work -- or to be toxic -- in a real-world setting. Looie496 (talk) 18:05, 19 October 2013 (UTC)
Thanks for letting us know. I've marked the article with a "needs secondary sources" tag and added it to this project's scope. The article's content may be scientifically reliable but on my quick skim it seems to reply heavily on primary sources and files from the website of the same name (lunasin.com). These sources are not reliable (WP:MEDRS)。 LT910001 (talk) 07:33, 20 October 2013 (UTC)
Depending on the claims made, these are probably reliable sources. You are allowed to WP:USEPRIMARY sources. We strongly discourage, but do not outright prohibit, them for medicine-related information. You might also consider whether the biggest problem is the lack of analysis (analysis is a common characteristic of secondary sources) or the sources' possible conflicts of interest. {{Third-party sources}} may be a more appropriate tag, and one that speaks directly to notability issues: if the only people writing sources for it are trying to make money off of it, then there should be no article at all. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:00, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

Historical redback spider treatment

We have a bit of a dilemma at redback spider which is at FAC at present. The issue is the last paragraph of the treatment section which mentions some historical treatments, mostly now so discounted they aren't even mentioned in any peer-reviewed review article I can find (apart from magnesium). Question is - is it better to list and discount them or just delete the paragraph altogether? Am a bit torn as I can see arguments both ways and wondered if anyone else did, though I suspect most folks will recommend removing (?). Cheers, Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 23:32, 17 October 2013 (UTC)

I would move the outdated treatments to the "Cultural impact" section maybe, but I have no experience with what is normal for such articles... Lesion (talk) 22:03, 18 October 2013 (UTC)
·Casliber Alternatively (little late for a comment, I know) move them to the history section if one exists. LT910001 (talk) 07:29, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

Please note that the short section in question uses the following sources for the historical aspects of the medical treatment of spider bites in Australia: Snowman (talk) 11:47, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

Hospital gown

Hello,

This article is rated as a "mid-importance" article on medicine, but it needs help. I tried to clean it up but I couldn't find any references, other than sales sites and patent applications. I think all the emphasis on children and teen age boys worrying about underwear shouldn't be the main focus of the article. It's also a "fashion" article, due to Diane von Fürstenberg having been commissioned to design hospital gowns for a clinic in Cleveland.

There's a good reference about the proper disposal of paper hospital gowns to prevent the spread of infections, and I think from personal experience that the point of hospital gowns for both patients and staff is to prevent infection, and (for patients) to allow access during surgery or other procedures to the relevant patient body parts by surgeons and medical technicians, etc.

This article pops up as first in all search engines I've tried because there doesn't seem to be any other info on the subject that I can find. Thanks, Soranoch (talk) 02:03, 18 October 2013 (UTC)

Have you tried specifically searching for nursing textbooks? WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:25, 18 October 2013 (UTC)
According to the article's definition, a hospital gown is "a long loose piece of clothing worn in a hospital by someone doing or having an operation." It's not in any online dictionary, except the one in the article.
Could you give me a tip on how to search specifically for nursing textbooks? I used all the search engines I know about, including academic ones. I don't know how to search outside of search engines. Soranoch (talk) 20:12, 18 October 2013 (UTC)
Not sure there is any searchable online repository of nursing textbooks. Would have to go to a medical library and do some old fashioned research. I think searching keywords "hospital gown" on Google books is the best bet... Lesion (talk) 21:54, 18 October 2013 (UTC)
Thanks, but a search keywords "hospital gown" on Google books is not very fruitful. I put in a couple of references in the article from that search, but they are about at the kindergarten level. This (which says that the hospital gown is to clothing what the VW car was to automobiles) is one of the few on google books. I removed from the article some of the obsession with boys being frightened and saddened by thinking about being forbidden to wear underwear.
I recommend that the importance of the article be reduced to "low" or whatever, since no one in the Medical Project is willing to fix it. Thanks for your answer though. I very much appreciate it. Soranoch (talk) 22:41, 18 October 2013 (UTC)
Low importance sounds reasonable for this topic. I had a look on google books when I posted above, agree not many sources. Google scholar is one page of patents as you suggested before. I tried altering the keywords to "patient gown" which seems to generate a bit more book results... not sure if any will help. Also not sure if anyone can access these sources and what they are like: [18]Difficult article to expand. At least the poor quality sources and unsourced content have gone now. Thanks for you efforts. Lesion (talk) 00:05, 19 October 2013 (UTC)
Thanks, Lesion for being truly helpful! Your comments gives me confidence that I do have judgment! Best, Soranoch (talk) 00:30, 19 October 2013 (UTC)
I usually search for "nursing" or "nurse" plus my other keywords (in this case, 'nursing gown'). It turns up books like this one.
There's also information in that search about sterile gowns (worn by medical staff), which aren't what most people think of when they hear the word "hospital gown". Perhaps this should be moved to "patient gown".
(We've got about a hundred articles per person watching this page [many of whom aren't primarily working on medicine-related articles, or only make a handful of edits each month]. This level of response is about normal, not an indication of nobody being interested.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:16, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

Importance and quality are two different scales on article assessment on Wikipedia; downgrading an article's importance because the article needs work is wrong. This information may be dated (from 2008), but it explains the difference: Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2008-06-23/Dispatches.

SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:32, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

Hand, Foot and Mouth Disease

Just putting in a request (already did on the assessment page without a response) for someone to reassess the article since I've worked on it a bit. Thanks in advance! TylerDurden8823 (talk) 15:26, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

 Done Done, with some feedback on the talk page. JFW | T@lk 18:50, 20 October 2013 (UTC)
Thank you! TylerDurden8823 (talk) 01:17, 23 October 2013 (UTC)

Female infertility

Hi,

This is Ally, I've recently made some edits to the society and culture page the female infertility article. I hope that the additions made will help contribute to an overall more balanced article. The edits I have made involve the world approach to female infertility, a growing global concern. I will continue to edit this page for my class, and hope that they will help to increase the rating and traffic to this site. I am open to suggestions and advice if you are willing to help and contribute. If you have questions, concerns, or comments, please let me know on my talk page. AllyBremer (talk) 22:56, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

Columnist attacks med school’s homework to edit Wikipedia

As mentioned in the Signpost (Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2013-10-16/News_and_notes), there is this. Best. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 09:26, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

Is anyone willing to help write a short reply? Feel free to start one below. Does anyone know if the publication would publish it? I see the comments are going in our favor, but I'd like for us to organize and write a paragraph or two. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 09:30, 22 October 2013 (UTC)
Am tempted to respond and hit the nail on the head, but conversely this is article is very small and responding may elevate its notoriety and be counter-productive. If a reply had to be drafted, suggest something like: Wikipedia is one of the most accessed health-related resources on the internet, if not the most. It has an accuracy comparable to, if not exceeding, other encyclopedias. Wikipedia editing enshrines many principles which are very important to the practice of medicine, including presenting and structuring information in a clear, cohesive and comprehensive way, using a strong evidence-base and understanding what constitutes good sources, understanding the internationalisation of medicine and regional variation, and operating in a collaborative environment. Given this, the author of the column might benefit from participating. LT910001 (talk) 10:04, 22 October 2013 (UTC)
The four responses in the "comments" section pretty much nail it - all supportive of the UCSF course and positive toward Wikipedia, so personally I'd rather leave it at that. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 10:13, 22 October 2013 (UTC)
That works. Thanks. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 15:31, 22 October 2013 (UTC)
If homework material is developed by students in user space and approved by their instructors before being transferred to article space, then that would improve reliability.
—Wavelength (talk) 16:03, 22 October 2013 (UTC)
Hello Wavelength. Yes, that possibility is mentioned at the end of WP:INSTRUCTORS, but I would imagine this course wouldn't need that sort of insurance policy against the quality of their edits. Feel free to comment at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Medicine/UCSF Elective 2013 if you'd like. Time will tell, I guess. Best. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 16:55, 22 October 2013 (UTC)
I don't think there's much point in responding to a student's opinion piece, especially since her analysis didn't extend even so far as to explain why she expects academic credit for learning material and writing a short paper about it, but she doesn't think that other students shouldn't get credit for essentially learning material, writing a short paper about it, and posting it in public. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:52, 22 October 2013 (UTC)
Yes, that is quite a good point. LT910001 (talk) 04:20, 23 October 2013 (UTC)


I found a cure for the common cold...

... in Wikipedia:Articles for Creation, at Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Zinc lozenges and the common cold, and wondered if this is concerning. The author of the AfC submission seems to share a name with the author of some of the cited sources. Arthur goes shopping (talk) 11:34, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

What a hook! LT910001 (talk) 11:56, 21 October 2013 (UTC)
Yes and he added a comment to a journal article and than attempted to use that comment to refute the review article in question. I am not impressed. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 14:52, 25 October 2013 (UTC)
The tragic thing here is that the author of our article here had built it predominantly around his own paper, but has put a chronology online of that paper's systematic rejection by quality journals before it ended up in a pay-to-publish marginal one. This was intended, I think, to show that mainstream journals were biased against his findings; but in Wikipedia terms they have the opposite effect in categorizing the paper as less-than-ideally RS. Suffice it to say, there was a lot of undue weighting here which I have attempted to address in a moderate re-write of our text. Alexbrn talk|contribs|COI 19:39, 25 October 2013 (UTC)

Tea tree oil

I have been editing this article recently, and there are some differences of opinion on how/whether certain information about safety and clinical effectiveness should be mentioned; more eyes would be helpful. (Also posted to WP:FT/N some days ago, but the topics at hand are now more pertinent to this project). Alexbrn talk|contribs|COI 14:39, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

I made a recent revert. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 17:00, 23 October 2013 (UTC)

Blausen Medical donation

Over at DVT there was recently that edit. I suspect there is an issue with the external link added in the caption, but thanks for the image, User:BruceBlaus. We need more medical images. See WP:MEDPIC and m:Grants:IdeaLab/Medi-Graphics, please. Also a ping to User:Ocaasi. Best. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 09:58, 23 October 2013 (UTC)

I left a note in the "External link" section on the user's page, though there might be more promotional links out there to blausen.com. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 15:56, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
For reference, you can find all of the external links to a given website by using Special:LinkSearch; for all the blausen links, see [19]. It looks like the aptly-named Deli nk is removing them as we speak. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 16:40, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
I have finished removing all the inappropriate external links attached to the image captions. They were promotional in nature, in my opinion. Deli nk (talk) 16:47, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
Thanks Ten and Deli nk. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 16:58, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
Although a link is not appropriate and they should be removed, the Blausen Medical collection should be highlighted somehow. This seems like the kind of thing that User:Ocaasi would put in both the health and library newsletters. Lots of users who make large media donations need their collections processed and presented in some nice way. What would be an appropriate response for acknowledging donations like this? Blue Rasberry (talk) 18:10, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
An external link in the caption is inappropriate but can we wikilink to Blausen in the caption?
Colin, might one or more of these make the cut for Wikipedia:Featured pictures or Wikipedia:Picture of the day? Would a thank you letter from Sue Gardner be appropriate? --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 19:31, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
Perhaps we could link that, but unfortunately the Blausen Medical article needs a cleanup first, in my opinion. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 08:37, 24 October 2013 (UTC)
I almost never review diagrams at FP, as I'm mainly interested in photographs. But good quality diagrams can be FPs. They tend to attract/need reviewers knowledgeable about the subject who can appreciate/criticise the qualities and perhaps compare to the literature. There are also reviewers who know what to look for in a good diagram (e.g. font legibility). The SVG format is encouraged as it scales so well, but for some images, PNG is fine. You could post a message on the FP talk page on Wikipedia and/or Commons and see what other people think. Alternatively, look at the FP criteria yourself and pick one you think may be a winner. For WP, the image has to be in an article, but on Commons this isn't required. Colin°Talk 22:36, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
Thanks. I'll take a look tonight. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 10:00, 24 October 2013 (UTC)
  • aortic stenosis
    aortic stenosis
  • eye anatomy
    eye anatomy
  • cochlear implant
    cochlear implant
  • synapse types
    synapse types
Why should we link to Blausen in the caption? This is specifically something we do not do. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 14:48, 25 October 2013 (UTC)
I agree that linking to contributors in the caption is something that we do not do. An exception in which this is done for unusually desired content is at Wikipedia:GLAM/smarthistory, and even though I really appreciate the linking to that content I also wish that it could be replaced with an unbranded alternative. Blue Rasberry (talk) 14:19, 29 October 2013 (UTC)
We link to the artist in historical articles and when the illustration is by a dead artist (example). I see no problem with linking to the artist in this case either. Why would we do it? To inform the reader, and acknowledge the artist. Can anyone tell me what harm it would do? "We don't do that" is no reason at all. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 04:56, 31 October 2013 (UTC)
That's quite a good point Anthony, by pointing out that "We don't do that" is no reason at all. I think the "no" impulse comes from a place of reason (the no watermark preference). However, any wikilink should inform the reader about the subject of the article. So I would actually argue against linking in the ectopic pregnancy example. But, because I think we should acknowledge the artist, the best solution currently in my mind, is to have a subtle greyed out Blausen Medical at the end of the caption text that does not link to Blausen. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 11:48, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

We do not give attribution within the articles for authors of the text, why would we give attribution within the articles for those who have taken the pictures or created the pictures? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 12:04, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

I agree that many of the images are really good. We have had many other large donations of images including from ECGepedia, ECHOpedia, and Radiopaedia and have not attributed them. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 12:16, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

I'm still not seeing any reason why we shouldn't cite the creator of an image in its caption and link to their article if they have one - as we do frequently throughout this encyclopedia. Is there a policy-based reason for opposing this? --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 17:56, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

Because photo credits and similar in-caption publicity for image creators is WP:UNDUE in most cases. In the case of a historically important image, the name of the artwork or the artist is often useful and relevant information: readers will recognize the names of certain of very famous artists, and some may want to learn more about the style of artwork or the history of the specific image. For example, there has been a famous painting in the lead of Suicide off and on, and people looking at that image might like to read more about it (e.g., to find out if it's really a picture of a suicide). In those cases, we provide information about the image and links out to the relevant content.
In all other cases, we don't provide any in-article information about the image at all. Modern graphical images are part of the "all other cases" category. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:04, 1 November 2013 (UTC)
Awesome explanation, as usual What. Thanks. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 18:22, 1 November 2013 (UTC)

CCSVI...again

There is an active dispute at Chronic cerebrospinal venous insufficiency (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) regarding what to include from – or whether to mention – a recent imaging study in The Lancet on CCSVI: [20]. The article was accompanied in The Lancet by a third-party comment discussing some of the context, past work in the area, and implications of the study: [21]. More eyes would be very much welcome on the talk page: Talk:Chronic cerebrospinal venous insufficiency#Lancet trial. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 15:29, 23 October 2013 (UTC)

Have weighted in. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 01:55, 25 October 2013 (UTC)

Regarding the absence of a very well known info on SEXUAL DESIRE on wikipedia

This question is related to sexual desire of males. In the article SEXUAL DESIRE i could not find a very well known fact. It is generally seen that in sexually active active males, the time gap between the ejaculations affects their sexual desire. For example, if a man masturbates or ejaculates regularly(say once a day or once every two days or twice a day) and suddenly stops it, his sexual desire(or what we call libido) increases..It is also observed that the orgasm after a period of abstinence are also intense and getting and erection in a short term abstinence period is quicker..Why does this happen..? And why does wikipedia not mention i under the factors affecting sexual desire ..? I know that males are made to release their sperms once in a while. But why could i not find a reason or mention of it on wikipedia...many thanksEd beerman (talk) 05:52, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

Most Wikipedia articles are incomplete and are a work in progress. There is a Wikiproject Sexology and sexuality, where maybe editors with specific interest in improving this article with you might be recruited: WT:SEX. Not to say that someone here might respond to your query, I am just trying to be helpful. Lesion (talk) 09:06, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

Request for mentor for new user

We have a new user who's created the article Zinc and the common cold. This user is a new user and I feel they would benefit from a warm-hearted mentor willing to explain about this project, our goals, and some of our standards (eg use of reliable sources). That user is User:Hhemila. LT910001 (talk) 08:59, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

Maybe that's a section we should have on the WP:MED page. Who is willing to be a mentor? I'm willing. We do have a Wikipedia-wide mentorship program, though I've never participated it in. See Wikipedia:Adopt-a-user/Adoptee's Area/Adopters. Maybe we should seek to have some people named explicitly on the project page and listed at that Adoptee's area page. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 13:12, 24 October 2013 (UTC)
I'm now reminded of outreach:Talk:Welcome to Wikipedia (Bookshelf)/2013 edition/draft, where I mention how bad the "community portal" is.... Hmmm... Adoptees should feature prominently (in the pictures at the top) wherever we have a portal, I would imagine. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 13:17, 24 October 2013 (UTC)
What happened to that special med user introduction proposed a while ago, Biosthmors? LT910001 (talk) 22:08, 24 October 2013 (UTC)
You mean Template:MedWelcome Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 03:45, 25 October 2013 (UTC)
Doc James, what do you mean? And LT, that should go on the WP:MED page, but it hasn't gotten there, nor have I started doing it myself, if that's what you're getting at. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 15:00, 25 October 2013 (UTC)

Collaboration with students, editor retention, shared goals, etc.

Because we want to do/are doing outreach to medical students/nursing students, etc., I think we should do a favor for them. That way they will be more willing to continue working with us, in my opinion. At least that's how I view it. I notice WP:MED has 0 featured lists. I think we should make the goal of having list of medical mnemonics become our first a featured list. That way we'll have 5 goals, and I think we should stop there. Right now we have 4, so I think there is room for one more. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 13:07, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

Would this be suitable as a collaboration of the month? Lesion (talk) 13:40, 24 October 2013 (UTC)
If people want to work on it, then that's great. For myself, I can't say I'd do any more than do outreach to medical students about it though. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 13:47, 24 October 2013 (UTC)
And then answer any questions those newbies had about editing the page, which might involve me making direct edits to tidy things up. =) Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 13:49, 24 October 2013 (UTC)
User:Ocaasi, aren't you familiar with reddit? Maybe we could do some other internet outreach about this page. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 13:49, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:50, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

Awesome. They weren't showing at WP:MED#How_to_help. No I just can't read. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 13:51, 24 October 2013 (UTC)
In fact, there are 10: Category:FL-Class medicine articles (reflecting a good deal of work by User:Colin). More importantly, does anyone have a single example of a student editor who has helped content and has stayed around to continue helping? (Since both Colin and I are consumed lately with correcting student edits?) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:55, 24 October 2013 (UTC)
I hear there's this Nephron guy who started as a medical student... and NCurse, and Eleassar, and Diberri, and a bunch of others, actually. Not everyone lists themselves in Category:Wikipedian medical students or displays {{User medical student}}. WhatamIdoing (talk) 10:04, 25 October 2013 (UTC)
No, WhatamIdoing, those are all volunteer editors who happen to be students, not "student editors", and they don't make "student edits". The difference is absolutely huge and I'm disappointed you are confusing them in order to make some kind of point in response to Sandy. Colin°Talk 11:05, 25 October 2013 (UTC)
Causes of autism is generating the most trouble now, I gather? I'll take a look later today. But to answer your question, I've seen two, if I remember correctly, but I've personally observed a trend where the more positive interaction they get with a Wikipedian, the more likely they are to make edits after the class ends. I'll one up you, though. ;-) The professor I helped the most, and had the most interaction about Wikipedia with, makes an edit here and there on occasion. I'd say that being able to get the professor to vouch for student edits is superior than just having a student stick around. =) Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 14:01, 24 October 2013 (UTC)
No, that course is only one of many that are hitting my watchlist now ... for example, we also have potential meatpuppetry at echolalia, which is most likely unidentified student editing, although I can't get a single editor there to respond to talk. I'm still looking for a single case where results amount to a fraction of effort expended. Yes, the course discussed at User talk:Sanetti is going to hit multiple medical Featured articles with text that is likely to be UNDUE based on the course focus; who gets to help? Also, Colin knows featured lists better than I do, but I doubt that the comprehensive criterion could be met for list of medical mnemonics. Meaning, I think we could find far more useful ways to do something about editor retention, student editors, and the effect the latter is having on the former. (For example, beefing up a guideline to deal with these messes.) But WMF employees will fight and put up faulty analyses of the benefits of student editing every step of the way, so ... soldier on, unpaid troops !!! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:09, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

Oh I only did three of the ten medical featured lists and that was a long time ago. And I haven't reviewed at FL for years. But actually now you mention it, doing a list might be quite a good thing for a newbie or students. Lots of editors at WP cut their teeth on featured lists before progressing to full articles. You are much less likely to end up with an essay, or something controversial, or repeat work done elsewhere. I'm not sure about the medical mnemonics -- unlikely to be of interest to anyone other than medical students. Colin°Talk 14:23, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

FWIW, because this reminded me, and it was before Biosthmor's time: I remember good student work going into Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Osteochondritis dissecans and Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Phagocyte, but those two editors had 1:1 wiki mentors who were very experienced with FAs. These students were from a high school biology class, and a project which ran in 2008, 2009, 2010, and 2011. The classes primarily edited natural science articles; only 8 articles were WP:MED related. Out of a total of approximately 50 students, a few were arguably retained for a short period, but none is still editing except the teacher. Maralia (talk) 14:47, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

Phagocyte had GrahamColm and Colin on board, and you may have noted that I did not promote Osteochondritis dissecans. Just sayin', because I don't see an example of good student editing yet. To further clarify: I cannot speak to the other content review processes, but at WP:FAC, every student-edited nomination I saw, promoted, or didn't promote concerned me to the extent that the work had to be pulled up to standard (and sometimes not) by established and knowledgeable FA writers, to such an extreme that I worried about the overall drain on the process and wondered if our scarce resources were being well used. Not only that, but in some cases so many of our FA writers and FAC reviewers were involved in some projects that they became cheerleaders for the article, critical review slid, and I had to wait for independent reviewers to point out issues that were abundantly apparent. It would be possibly worth the effort if any of the new or student editors stayed around to return the favor, but as far as I know, they do not and have not. So, we put a drain on our scarce resources, where FA writers who could be doing many other needed tasks end up doing a prof's work for little return, and training students who most typically move on after they've done the obligatory work to get their grade. The students are not invested in Wikipedia: they are here for a grade. When we can barely keep articles clean, how do we have time to be doing TA work? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:45, 24 October 2013 (UTC)
I understand your concerns. I hope we do things right at Wikipedia:WikiProject Medicine/UCSF Elective 2013, and in such a cautious way that we don't eventually overburden WP:MED if we're successful. Is anyone interested in pairing up with students for that class, if pairing occurs? Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 15:53, 24 October 2013 (UTC)
And I'm not sure what your critera are, but I would imagine at least one associated with the classes mentioned at Wikipedia:Student_assignments#Examples_of_best_practices has left behind a quality contribution. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 16:09, 24 October 2013 (UTC)
I agree that the list would probably not meet the comprehensive criteria, and would most likely be an absolute monster without some tricky formatting such as the Abbr template (or other fancy formatting). I think welcoming new editors is probably more effective than engaging classes in retaining users, but on the other hand there a lot of articles that need attention and classes may be able to provide that. That said, I would hope that contentious articles or high-class articles are not the focus of such editing. LT910001 (talk) 22:28, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

MEDDATE wording

I have concern about how a sentence in MEDDATE may be giving the wrong impression from the rest of the guideline on WP:MEDRS. Discussion here WT:MEDRS#Suggested reword to MEDDATE section.

Also, is the archiving bot still not working? Did this occur because of the cosmetic changes to the templates recently or is it a wider issue? Lesion (talk) 13:36, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

Thanks, I think it may be due to a wider issue, I mentioned this in somewhere in a thread on Archive 39, the bot was down then and may still be. I've archived threads > 5 days old. Also, have posted on the talk page, your wording is much more readable. LT910001 (talk) 22:13, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

Leaky gut

I have just done a major re-write of this article. It seems to me one of those cases where a fringe altmed topic is piggy-backing onto something more legitimate: that while "leaky gut" is a real phenomenon, the world-view in which it causes most things (e.g. autism, diabetes, etc.), and in which those can be "treated" with diets and supplements, is full-blown quackery. We were wondering in Talk how to deal with this. In particular I am wondering whether the legitimate "leaky gut" bits can be moved into legitimate articles, leaving this as a clearly-categorizable article on "leaky gut syndrome". Any gut experts in the house? Alexbrn talk|contribs|COI 14:58, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

No gut expert, but I am surprised to hear you say that this is "piggy-backing on something more legitimate"... was not aware this topic was considered legitimate at all... I feel a good example of what you describe would be "small intestinal bacterial overgrowth"; for which there is a legitimate scientific literature, and also a larger topic of commercially-motivated, CAM industry claims. I could draw a venn diagram of this. Lesion (talk) 15:15, 24 October 2013 (UTC)
Thank you for your efforts btw. Watchlisted in case anyone shows up and tries to revert back to how it was before. Lesion (talk) 15:19, 24 October 2013 (UTC)
IMO, should probably be redirected to protein losing enteropathy, with merger of any appropriately sourced content. MastCell Talk 15:25, 24 October 2013 (UTC)
As Alexbrn said, this is a real thing which has been hyped up in popular culture. The scientific name is typically intestinal permeability which redirects to leaky gut. There's actually a pretty substantial body of high-profile literature around intestinal permeability, and it's not clear that it's directly related to losing protein. Although you wouldn't guess it from QW's perfunctory note about its faddishness, the research dates back to at least the late 1970s (probably earlier) with Menzies et al 1979 (which was about sugars, not protein), and numerous reviews including the highly-cited Gastroenterology review by Bjarnason et al 1995. It's a fairly common and problematic thing in intestinal disorders. I was able to find a fully copy of a review PMID 11907349 (2002) online, but given the aggressive interpretations of WP:MEDDATE these days I won't bother citing it. A better choice if someone has access is Intestinal Permeability Defects: Is It Time to Treat? (2013). With regard to the autism connection, the 24 gastroenterology experts who wrote the 2013 review Non-Celiac Gluten Sensitivity: The New Frontier of Gluten Related Disorders don't say it is quackery (although they do say "only a small, selected sub-group of children affected by ASD may benefit from an elimination diet"), but perhaps they're just part of the growing woo conspiracy. A suspected connection to autism is not new; see for example D'Eufemia 1998. II | (t - c) 02:19, 25 October 2013 (UTC)
Thanks for those useful pointers to modern sources; I have incorporated them into the article. I suppose the money quote from the Gluten piece is: "The leaky gut/autism connection has fuelled a strong debate within the scientific community, far from being settled" - which is a bit more "open" that our NHS and skeptic sources; however the piece looks respectable enough. I don't suppose performing studies in the autism/leaky gut area is quackery; but delivering a "diagnosis" would be, and doing business off it it would be health fraud. Alexbrn talk|contribs|COI 06:00, 25 October 2013 (UTC)
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