Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Medicine

Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/WikiProject used

Some people here might like to see Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2013_April_6#Template:Expert-subject. There are currently 326 WPMED articles tagged with this template (list will be slow to load). WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:30, 11 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

They are silly templates IMO. I guess we could just remove them from WP:MED articles. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 20:59, 14 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Do you agree with the alternative medicine articles to be treated differently from mainstream medicine articles?

Such as adding a section about it in WP:MEDRS? Or better yet establishing WikiProject Alt Medicine and establishing it's own version of MEDRS - ALTMEDRS?

Many articles about Alt Med are not informative. That is because few or no reliable secondary sources exists to support the content. That are the facts on the ground. By virtue, anything is generally called Alt Med because not enough research has been conducted. Once enough research has been conducted it's generally no longer Alt Med.

I would give an analogue to Olympic games and Paralympic games. Can we request Paralympic athletes to follow all the regulations and perform similarly to Olympic athletes? Aren't we giving them special considerations? So far there is only one athlete, Pistorius that has managed to perform well and cross from Paralympic to Olympic games.

Is there any editor that is aware of any Alt Med article that has been nominated for GA? Many editors said that under current conditions it's very difficult to maintain Alt Med articles. Many editors have agree that there are many gaps in alt med article's coverage on the Wikipedia. Ryanspir (talk) 15:35, 11 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

If you're talking about making the use of secondary source non mandatory for alt med pages (not sure if this what you mean, since there are no specific details provided as to how you would change the policy), this is not merely making it non MEDRS, its making it non WP:RS...basically suggesting that the same content rules that apply to the whole encyclopedia should not apply to alt med topics, is that correct? Lesion (talk) 15:44, 11 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

To clarify, at this topic I do not propose any concrete measures. I'm letting know of the issue and would like to receive possible proposals. Thank you. Ryanspir (talk) 16:00, 11 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Apologies, I thought from what you said you were proposing the above. FYI, I think there is already a WP:WikiProject Alternative medicine. Lesion (talk) 16:20, 11 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I'm glad that I have provided a clear clarification. Thanks for the link. Are there also 1. anything like altmedrs; 2. guidelines for writing alt med articles? Ryanspir (talk) 17:06, 12 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Ryan, yes, Wikipedia has a special guideline covering the sourcing for biomedical claims made in alt-med articles, or for health claims for alt-med interventions made in any article, anywhere. The guideline is: WP:MEDRS. Zad68 17:15, 12 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

This is just wrong: "few or no reliable secondary sources exists to support the content"—you know, except for the 8,000 review articles published in the last five years that you find at PubMed if you search for alternative medicine, not to mention the hundreds of books on the market. (Most health-related books are secondary sources.) There has been so much research done that we've even got reviews of other reviews, like PMID 23472485. There is no shortage of research. Once you've fully exploited those thousands of sources, then you can come back and complain about a lack of acceptable sources.

This is also wrong: "Once enough research has been conducted it's generally no longer Alt Med." Something becomes conventional, rather than alternative, when it is accepted, not when it is supported by evidence. Some AltMed is evidence-based; most is not. This is not normally because of a lack of research, but because the research proved that it didn't actually work. Most conventional medicine is evidence-based; some is not. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:40, 12 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

@Ryanspir: Moreover; since prior probability of alt med theories is so very low (See for example homeopathy), and extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence I would agree with you that there should be an specific guideline for altmed (ALTMEDRS?), which however (from my point of view) should indicate that any proposed claim of evidence regarding altmed treatments should be taken with huge care unless there were simply no possible doubt on its scientific validity and reliability.

ALTMEDRS in a nutshell:Only clear consensus among the highest quality secondary sources can be used to propose the efficacy of any treatment with a low prior probability of working due to a lack of scientific base. This includes most treatments under the umbrellas of Alternative medicine, CAM or integrative medicine.

--Garrondo (talk) 22:14, 12 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Support adding this as ALTMEDRS Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 23:37, 12 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

That sounds a bit like "Don't say that anything 'alt med' works, unless you can get the Cochrane Collaboration to triple-swear that it does." I don't really believe that we need special rules for alt med. There have been so many thousands of research papers and reviews published on alt med therapies that we can follow the same standards that we would use for a conventional treatment. For example, the type of sources you would use to write about the efficacy of antihistamines when you have the common cold are the same type of sources you should use to write about the efficacy of an herbal preparation when you have the common cold. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:25, 13 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

This is not special rules for alt med. This is more like the same rules for alt med as for medicine. This is "if a 2006 Cochrane review says it doesn't work do not dig up an 1998 systematic review quoted by a 2008 literature review in an attempt to refute said Cochrane review" which is were we are at now. Or if a review in JAMA says it does not work do not attempt to say it does with a source only available in Chinese.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 02:48, 13 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see any need for a separate alt med guideline. We require exactly the same strength of evidence behind any health-related claim, regardless of who's making it. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 05:50, 13 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

When I wrote the line on Altmedrs I was half in "irony mode" half not. While I do not really think Altmedrs is neccesary as a separate page, I wrote that lines since it is probably a good idea to have in mind that alt med is a domain were it is specially important to describe scientific consensus among secondary sources since it is quite easy to find (short of) secondary low quality sources (either reviews or metanalisis) in crappy journals which are far from being reliable. In this sense it is specially so for meta-analysis since primary research is of so low quality that metaanalyisis of that data is in many cases invalid but widely done to make a point. I do not know if it could be useful to integrate some of this content is MEDRS or is really not necessary.--Garrondo (talk) 19:29, 13 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I was thinking some clarification on alt med could be added to medrs. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 21:33, 13 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Fundamentally Support adding some sort of Alt Med clarifying statement to WP:MEDRS and liked the direction Garrondo was heading in. We should then create a WP:ALTMEDRS shortcut to it. Agree with others here that we're not making up special rules for Alt Med by doing thus, just clarifying the application of existing sourcing policy and guideline to this area. Zad68 04:26, 14 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Support creation of Altmedrs and propose to move the talk to AltMedicine talk page. That's where it should be decided what have to be included in it.

Propose also an essay/policy that will overview the issues facing editors while writing alt med article. Propose to have some special considerations for alt med, according to a consensus on AltMedicine talk page. Recommend to explicitly explain what do in case no secondary reliable studies can be found, and in cases that also no reliable primary research can be found. Ryanspir (talk) 15:10, 15 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The requirements for any medicine-related article should be the same. I strongly oppose any hint of allowing a different set of policies for alt.med. The only content that could possibly be relevant in an altmed policy would be reiteration of what is required and accepted for a medical article. Since this would be redundant with what we already have there is no reason to add it. With regard to:

"Recommend to explicitly explain what do in case no secondary reliable studies can be found, and in cases that also no reliable primary research can be found."

it is already clear. Secondary sources are preferred for medical claims. Notable primary studies can be used under some circumstances. If neither primary or secondary sources exist then no comment can be made.Desoto10 (talk) 18:01, 15 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

How about anecdotal reports, amazon reviews and other practical use information? Shouldn't we use them especially in cases that no reliable sources exist? Ryanspir (talk) 14:14, 17 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Absolutely not, per WP:V and WP:RS. If as you say "no reliable sources exist" the solution is not to start using the unreliable source that is customer-provided Amazon reviews. This idea is a complete non-starter. Zad68 14:34, 17 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

This substance works by letting E-Coli bacteria to attach to D-mannose and be "escorted" out of the body. The reliable sources about how it functions can be found on the WP:MEDRS discussion.

My question is, is that mechanism of action is absolutely unique? Is there any medicine on the market or in the development that works not by killing bacteria, but rather by allowing bacteria to attach to it? Thank you.

P.S. I'm asking this question, because it's a very interesting mechanism of action that may not result in bacteria resistance. Ryanspir (talk) 15:40, 11 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Why is the question being asked here? And were exactly has it been asked before? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 18:36, 11 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Agree with Doc James; when you point to the right page for discussion, I'll be happy to explain some of the ways in which those statements about mannose and E. coli are incorrect. -- Scray (talk) 03:26, 12 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Is it any problem with this question being asked here? We can make a long discussion about that, but perhaps a short answer would be more appreciated, like yes, there is this name of medicine that works with a similar action; or no, we are not aware of such a medicine.

Scray, lets not make it a discussion about how effective (or not) d-mannose is. My question in this topic is purely on the mechanism of action. Ryanspir (talk) 17:03, 12 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

We care less about the believed mechanism of action and more about if something works or not.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 19:08, 12 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

• Let me just note that the appropriate place for questions of this sort are the Reference desks -- in this case WP:RD/S, the Science desk. Looie496 (talk) 19:17, 12 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you Looie496. I have posted it at the suggested location. To Doc James, of course its very important if it works or not, however it's also important if the targeted bacteria can or will develop a resistance. Its my observations, that many types of bacteria has developed some level of resistance to anti-bacterials in the past ten-twenty years. I'm proving a hypotheses that this novel action of curing might not result in resistance, since no bacteria is being killed. The potential is enormous, anti-HIV drugs for example that allow the virus to attach itself to the drug and be escorted out of the body without killing the virus. That's just an example, please don't capitalize on the quality of the example. Ryanspir (talk) 14:59, 15 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I think your view of resistance is probably over-simplistic. First of all, d-mannose resistance already exists in a number of bacterial strains which cause UTIs (e.g. PMID 15557655, PMID 17854474). That's not surprising if you think about it. Let's assume that d-mannose impairs bacterial adhesion. If a single bacterium happens, through genetic variation, to produce adherence molecules resistant to the effect of d-mannose, then it will remain in the bladder while all of its competitors are "escorted out", as you put it. This bacterial clone will then enjoy a huge ecological niche, since all of its competitors were eliminated by d-mannose, and will rapidly expand to fill that niche. This is the same principle by which bacteria develop resistance to antibiotics, and it's sort of magical thinking to believe that d-mannose would be exempt from it. MastCell ^Talk 17:50, 15 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Allow me to correct myself. I meant to say 'evolving resistance'. And this is precisely my point. Because bacteria is not being killed, but being tricked to adhere to d-mannose and then escorted out of the body, I think it may not develop any resistance. Do you see the potential brilliance of it? The bacteria evolves resistance in order to survive against agents that kill it. But in this case, there is no killing present and the bacteria knows its outside the body only when it's already outside the body. While it's adhering to d-mannose, it still believes it adheres to bladder walls. :) Ryanspir (talk) 14:23, 17 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Again, I think you're missing the point. It doesn't really matter what a particular bacterium "believes", insofar as bacteria are capable of belief in the first place. Bacterial cell death is not necessary in order for resistance to develop. All that's required is for a particular mutation to confer an advantage in a particular niche.

Assuming d-mannose works as advertised, it will remove most bacteria from the bladder, leaving only d-mannose-resistant clones behind. Those clones then enjoy a huge advantage - they have the niche all to themselves without any competition, and can proliferate to "fill" the bladder niche. And then you have a d-mannose-resistant UTI. You're committing a common logical error, in supposing that "natural" or alternative treatments are magically exempt from the basic biological principles which apply to rationally developed pharmaceuticals. MastCell ^Talk 18:24, 17 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry for the late reply MastCell. Actually I thought about the reasoning you have posted even before you have posted iy :). I think that the resistance you are talking about is inherited resistance. But I'm referring to evolving resistance. What do you think? Just please give it a bit of deep thinking before you will reply. It might be you will see my point clearly and consider that I'm right. However, of course I might be wrong. Waiting for your opinion. All of bacteria has resistance to different agents, however it's the evolving resistance that currently challenges mainstream medicine. Ryanspir (talk) 19:07, 27 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

BTW, as was suggested above, this is addressed RD/S#D-mannose. -- Scray (talk) 20:02, 17 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Could members of this project please have a look at DualPortGYN Surgical Technique? I can't find any coverage of the technique from reliable, secondary sources online, just lots of company press releases. None of the secondary references cited so far mention DualPortGyn, though all talk about dual port laparoscopy, which certainly seems to be notable. But how is DualPortGyn WP:Notable enough for an encyclopedia article? Thanks, Captain Conundrum (talk) 10:13, 12 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Yes agree. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 16:04, 12 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Also agree that we should probably make a dual port laparoscopy article with much of this material moved there first, then split off in the future if the material warrants. Yobol (talk) 13:43, 17 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Well it's just been proposed for deletion by another editor, so there's a week left to move it (or copy to a draft subpage). If someone with a reasonable knowledge of laparoscopy can point out the good content, I'm happy to help dig for more references etc. Thanks, Captain Conundrum (talk) 08:39, 20 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

One possible template to work from for dual-port laparoscopy is the existing article single-port laparoscopy. Captain Conundrum (talk) 17:46, 21 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

A reader at help desk mentioned that we should include Period of purple crying in Wikipedia. See Wikipedia:Help_desk#period_of_purple_crying (April 13) for detail. This subject is way out of my expertise though. Thoughts?.--Canoe1967 (talk) 16:07, 14 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I hope someone writes that one. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 16:28, 14 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The basic framework is done in my user space. The video reference has a 'nutshell' description and probably just needs paraphrasing (to avoid copyvio), into a short lead. The external link should have more detail in text. I would probably make a mess if I expand it further.--Canoe1967 (talk) 16:41, 14 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

~35K hits on google, so seems to meet notability. Consider including content + linking the main crying article. Lesion (talk) 17:17, 14 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

... And ~4 hits on Trip Database, of which zero are secondary. The popular press and social media seem to understand the phrase, but medical literature seems only to mention it in association with "shaken baby syndrome". I'm not very impressed by the credentials of the sources that Google turns up either. Do any of the sources from Google "have a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy"? PMID 22954642 and PMID 19255028 look like the best bets for establishing notability, but all of the primary sources need to be used with care. --RexxS (talk) 18:22, 14 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The Dr. in the Youtube reference I added to the draft article is claimed to be a world expert. He claims that he is asked about it often. Is there a way to check his notabilty/credentials, etc? "Dr. Ronald Barr, Developmental Pediatrician and World Expert on Infant Crying, explains the Period of PURPLE Crying Program..."--Canoe1967 (talk) 18:47, 14 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It is a campaign to raise awareness about child abuse. A mention there might be sufficient.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 20:47, 14 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I am wondering if it could be an actual syndrome(?) that could cause child abuse similar to Posttraumatic stress disorder causing issues with soldiers recently. I don't know if it has been researched or codified at all. It may be a recent label on a very old condition?--Canoe1967 (talk) 21:03, 14 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

This book states "A national campaign, “The Period of Purple Crying,” is underway to educate parents about the normalcy of crying in infants and the dangers of shaking an infant. (See the website of the National Center on Shaken Baby Syndrome)"[1] which is similar to many other books. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 21:10, 14 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It is also a registered trademark, diseases and syndromes are not.[2] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 21:13, 14 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

As I said in the OP, I am out of my fields here. Could we have it as a redirect to "shaken baby syndrome" with a description of the campaign and the definition of the acronym? With the trademark I don't think we are violating copyright just documenting it. When readers wish to know what it refers to then at least they can find it by the common name. Does 'Two all-beef patties...' redirect to Mcdonald's?Two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun. An article on the awareness campaign may work as well. --Canoe1967 (talk) 21:24, 14 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Sure that would be fine with the campaign discussed in the section on "society and culture" Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 01:32, 15 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

You could mention this idea at Crying#Types_of_crying_in_infants. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:14, 15 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

We have a category, Category:Healthcare quality but no head article on Healthcare quality. Do you think one should be written? and (b), what should be the criteria for inclusion of an article in the Category:Healthcare quality category? --Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 17:37, 14 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It seems like one could definitely be written. If it was well written, I'd like for it to exist and that would help address your second question. Biosthmors (talk) 23:46, 14 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I also noticed this recently. I started an article. I am not sure what should go into this but I would develop it further if others participated. Blue Rasberry (talk) 17:32, 15 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, I am reviewing Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Tachycardia-dependent bundle branch block for AfC. My first instinct was that it should be merged to the article Bundle branch blocks. I find however that the following exist as seperate articles: Heart block, First degree AV block, Second degree AV block, Third degree AV block, Right bundle branch block, Left bundle branch block, Left anterior fascicular block, Left posterior fascicular block, Bifascicular block, Trifascicular block. Is this OK? Or would it not be more practical and give the reader more of an overview to merge all these articles under the title heart blocks or bundle branch blocks? At least in the case of Tachycardia-dependent bundle branch block, it is in my view better to treat the topic toghether with the Bradycardia dependent blocks under the title "rate dependent bundle branch blocks". But I think all the above named articles are better merged. What do I do?Ochiwar (talk) 18:21, 15 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

While I know nothing about this subject, GScholar and GBook searches show the term to be an important part of multiple studies, so the article could conceivably pass an AfD test. The article under review discusses both bradycardia and tachycardia dependent versions and mentions rate-dependent bundle branch blocks multiple times. Based on my very superficial understanding, I agree that "rate-dependent bundle branch block" may be the better topic. As someone who has eagerly waited for the results of an AfC review in the past, I wouldn't recommend holding up this article for the potentially considerable discussion it would take to make the proposed 12-way merge to Bundle branch block. --Mark viking (talk) 18:44, 15 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Tachycardia-dependent bundle branch block is just a rare event in patients who have BBB. Usually is due to reciprocating rythm. There is no reason to exist an individual page. Is better to put it as a section of BBB and of tachycardia articles. Doc Elisa ^✉ 19:13, 15 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I have accepted the article and taged it proposing a merger to Bundle branch block. I have also taged the following articles, proposing a merger with Bundle branch block i.e Right bundle branch block, Left bundle branch block, Left anterior fascicular block, Left posterior fascicular block, Bifascicular block, Trifascicular block. If there is consencus on this, I would prepare a tentative merged article containing all of the above for approval here.Ochiwar (talk) 16:35, 16 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Without having gone through all the literature, I would suspect that left bundle branch block and right bundle branch block both could easily have enough material for their own articles, but I suspect every other article in that list could probably be merged into one. Yobol (talk) 13:42, 17 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

These shouldn't be merged. These are very broad subjects, and the different types of blocks are identified and managed in different ways. A merged article would be unwieldy. --Arcadian (talk) 13:30, 22 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, I've made some edits to the PLOS Medicine page - I know that this group is primarily interested in medicine rather than medical journals so I've been in discussion with the group at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Academic_Journals#PLOS_Medicine. User:Biosthmors suggested I should let this group know about my edits. I'd be very grateful if members of this group would take a look at the edits I've made to ensure that they are fair, especially given my competing interest - I am an editor at PLOS Medicine (Paul Simpson). Thanks --Pjsimpso82 (talk) 09:55, 18 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Could anyone who comments on this please do it at Talk:PLOS Medicine? Also, I encourage people to comment in any way. This seems like an excellent opportunity to have a discussion about the relationship between academic journals in medicine (which are the source of so much content here) and Wikipedia. Blue Rasberry (talk) 14:46, 18 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Hi everybody, I need your help and advice. I created an article about a world known lymph specialist Waldemar Olszewski. I added to my article his main publications on the lymphatic system which are very important for his scientific profile. There is a person, his name is Captain Screebo, who deleted already twice all the publications fro my article. He says that my article is too long and if I don't stop undoing his addition (on my article!!!) he will report me and block my account. What can I do about it? Is it ok if I add those publications? They all have got PubMed index number and are important. The person who deleted all of them has no conections to medicine and has no idea what is important or not!!! Please give me an answer. Thanks! Anna Karolina Heinrich (talk) 15:03, 19 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

If you take a look at the edit history for that article, you'll see that it wasn't only Capt. Screebo, but also at least three other editors that trimmed the publications list or reverted your re-additions. It would be a good idea to discuss your proposed additions at the article's talk page, since there doesn't seem to be a WP:Consensus for adding them. Thanks, Captain Conundrum (talk) 15:15, 19 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Also Anna, please read WP:OWN. As surprising and frustrating as it might be, once you create it, the article is no longer your article, it is Wikipedia's. The thing to do about it is to read Wikipedia's policies regarding biographies of living persons WP:BLP, understand that you do not own any of the work you submit to Wikipedia, and learn about working within Wikipedia's collaborative developing environment. Zad68 15:30, 19 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Is Regeneration therapy a mainstream therapy? My PROD was removed and it is asserted that it is on the talk page. It also should be under wikiproject scope. IRWolfie- (talk) 10:45, 21 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Not a single proper ref. I have restored the PROD. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 12:08, 21 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

James actually does know that you can't restore a declined prod (other than a sticky BLP prod) :D. So the article is now at AfD: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Regeneration therapy. --RexxS (talk) 19:14, 21 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thank Rexx I remember just after I placed it and than changed to AfD. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 00:32, 22 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Very popular health articles including obesity, Diabetes mellitus, hypertension, pneumonia, tuberculosis, and many others are under page protection - perhaps perpetual page protection - which restricts unregistered users from editing them. I am not sure how page protection works, but some of these pages are showing a lock and some do not, and right now all of them are locked. Could I get some thoughts from other members of this board about the risks of leaving these unlocked? I believe that when it is practical, pages should be left unlocked, and that it is generally a bad idea to intend to leave articles locked perpetually. Thoughts from others? How much of a burden is there from unregistered users making bad edits? Blue Rasberry (talk) 14:02, 21 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

IMO most articles of good or featured status should be semi protected if they receive a fairly high degree of poor quality edits. This is especially true when they are of top importance and are some of our most viewed medical articles as the above are. None registered users can add comments to the talk page to suggest changes. I find pending changes to be a little clunky. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 14:28, 21 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

100% agree with Doc on this. Zad68 14:34, 21 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

In addition we typically need to protect many pages deal with sexually transmitted illnesses and psychiatric conditions as they get a great deal of vandalism. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 14:40, 21 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

While we're on the subject, I propose that we give the gynecomastia article more protection. This is another page that gets a good amount of vandalism as well. Thoughts? TylerDurden8823 (talk) 17:47, 21 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I have to disagree. Wikipedia can only flourish if we encourage new editors, and we know that making as many articles as possible editable by IPs has been a successful strategy since Wikipedia began. I know it's irritating to revert the piece of vandalism for the 100th time, but that's the price we pay for attracting new editors. May I suggest that for many of the articles that are presently semi-protected, we could consider changing to pending changes? That would keep vandalism out of view, but still allow IP editors to submit good-faith edits. We know there are certain types of article that PC doesn't work for (vary highly vandalised articles is one example), but is there any reason why we couldn't try changing some of those popular semi-protected articles to PC as an experiment and see if it helps? --RexxS (talk) 19:28, 21 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Agree with sticking to WP guidance (i.e. use PP as briefly and reluctantly as possible) to avoid frustrating new users and appearing to own articles. While we have differing levels of new content contribution and involvement (e.g. mop wielding), I suspect that one of the things most WPMED members share is an active and diverse watchlist. -- Scray (talk) 21:36, 21 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I support James here. I'd say that edits to these articles are >90% vandalism or highly misinformed edits. Health articles get a disproportionate amount of vandalism because of their visibility and troll magnetism. I'd much rather be doing editing rather than reverting/correcting total rubbish. JFW | T@lk 21:58, 21 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

This is exactly the point. Also, I question whether in general there really is "lots" of page protection. If I remember right there are tens of thousands of articles under WP:MED scope. How many are actually under protection? Is that number really at a higher ratio than for other projects, especially if you focus on the articles with the highest visibility, at GA or FA quality, and with the longest history of vandalism or poor quality edits? I also question the idea that semi-protecting the most visible and most contentious articles really goes against the principle of attracting new editors. IPs that make poor-quality (even if well-intentioned) edits at contentious articles with an invested editor base can get shot down hard, especially if it is (as described) the 100th time that kind of bad edit has been made. At these particular articles, the more likely thing that would happen to that IP would be to get driven away after a bad experience. These articles are the last ones you'd want a new IP editing for the first time. Also, if the principle is not just to attract new editors but to retain existing experienced editors, protecting those articles helps that for the reasons as Jfdwolff describes. Zad68 22:31, 21 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

We have two kinds of problems: One is malicious ("John has AIDS!") and mostly affects sex-related articles. The other is the garden-variety vandalism that any popular page attracts (it might be interesting to look at the protection status for the 100 or 500 most popular pages).

I like RexxS's suggestion for using pending changes, but I have a suggestion: why not run a randomized, controlled trial on reducing protection? Why not pick out a dozen or two medicine-related pages under long-term semi-protection, and randomize half to PC and half to SEMI? If dropping to PC works (e.g., does not result in lots of edits, because PC doesn't function so well on high-volume pages), then we'll do more of it. If it doesn't, then we can rest easy with our choice of SEMI. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:20, 22 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I would bet that less than 1% of our 26,000 medical articles are semi protected. I consider how we have used it right now "briefly and reluctantly". While I support pending changes in principle it is clunky and slow right now. We have it on breast cancer and it makes the article a pain to edit. It is even slower reverting vandalism with it.

We need to have a balance between everyone editing and making sure people have some commitment before editing. The first article I ever tried to edit was one that was semi protected. I made suggestions on the talk page and edited a less viewed article before returning and being able to bring this one to GA.

I have recently cut back my watchlist as I much prefer to write content than deal with vandalism. Most people can still edit most of Wikipedia most of the time. Many poor quality edits / vandalism never gets reverted (just check out some of these edis here) Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 00:29, 22 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I've removed everything added by Kazem.fa (talk · contribs) and 174.50.25.48 that hadn't already been removed, due to major concerns about their use of case studies and promotion of particular authors. Hope this is OK. Graham87 09:14, 22 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

See Kazem's response on my talk page, noting that he was unfamiliar with our guidelines for medical articles. We're now talking about this through email. As far as I'm concerned, this is resolved now, unless somebody strongly objects to my actions here. Graham87 15:04, 22 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for doing this. Blue Rasberry (talk) 15:38, 22 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

First of all I would like to sincerely thank Graham for kindly providing me with the guidelines of Wikipedia on how to write and revise the medical articles. As he mentioned I was not familiar with the guidelines for medical articles. However, there are some issues that I would like to discuss with you: What I added to medical pages was all based on scientific articles published in peer-reviewed journals. My assumption was that if each member of the scientific community adds the results of his or her studies to Wikipedia, it will help to spread the knowledge. Moreover, I added similar content to several pages because those fields are related to each other. I completely agree with Graham that systematic reviews and meta-analyses are the most reliable sources of information in the medical field. However, in order to be able to do systematic reviews and meta-analyses, you should have a minimum number of studies, usually more than 10. Most of the medical articles that I revised in Wikipedia were about rare diseases like pemphigus vulgaris, uremic pruritus or malnutrition in hemodialysis patients. Currently there are no systematic reviews and meta-analyses for these diseases specifically related to the field that I discussed. It's also noteworthy to mention that most of the studies that I referred to were done for the first time and therefore were novel. Therefore, I briefly mentioned the findings of those studies in the articles. As I mentioned previously, my goal was to share the new medical knowledge in layman's term in those Wikipedia articles. Please let me know what we should do in this situation that we don't have systematic reviews and meta-analyses. Should we withhold the information from the public until systematic reviews and meta-analyses may become available few years later?

Many thanks for your consideration. Kazem.fa (talk) 17:01, 22 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Take a look at WP:MEDRS, our guideline in choosing sources (you may already have). While secondary sources are preferred over primary articles professional text books are considered adequate secondary sources. I am sure that you would be able to find some info to such rare diseases in specific professional text books. If not, in most cases it means that actually content may not be notable enough to be included in an encyclopedia, altough (very) occasionally primary articles may be used (with extreme care). Regarding the "we could each add our results": wikipedia is not a repository of primary articles but an encyclopedia. Since there are hundreds of thousands of investigations each year the only way we have to weight them in in order to create meaningful content and not simply a list of articles (for that we already have pubmed) is to use secondary sources that indicate which results are important and which are not.

--Garrondo (talk) 19:53, 22 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Just as an example, Trip Database shows 125 articles matching "uremic pruritus" of which 12 are identified as secondary. There were however 35 controlled trials and 64 e-textbooks, so how would we decide which evidence to include unless we relied on secondary sources? I should also mention that "pemphigus vulgaris" has a 2009 Cochrane review and a British Association of Dermatologists guideline for management, so why would we want to try to analyse the 450 primary results on Trip ourselves? --RexxS (talk) 00:50, 23 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Garrondo and RexxS, many thanks for your clarification. I generally agree with what you have said. However, most guidelines and meta-analyses focus on management and treatment of diseases; i.e. other issues like pathophysiology of diseases are not usually included in these reports. For example the 2 secondary sources you have introduced about pemphigus focus on treatment of this disease. They don't discuss its pathophyisology. Moreover, it usually takes at least 2-3 years for new information to be cited in medical textbooks. Therefore, the textbooks are not usually up to date. That's why websites like uptodate.com have been developed that renew their articles every few months. However, I certainly agree with you that it's better to use secondary sources as references when they are available in order to reduce bias of selection. Thank you again. Kazem.fa (talk) 01:04, 23 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Literature reviews are usually good for pathophysiology and it allows new ideas to stand a bit of test of time. Uptodate.com does not really discuss pathophys either. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 03:49, 23 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

My medical English class are starting their final projects, articles for en.wiki either 600 (min) or 1200 (min) words long, depending on whether it is being done alone or in pairs. I created sandboxes for these projects so that we do not have conflicts. I have worked to explain WP:MEDS guidelines on sources and believe we are following these (they did annotated bibliographies first). We could use whatever time you may have to browse through the articles in progress and give feedback, especially as to the content as Im an English teacher, not a doctor. The sandboxes are set up here for the two groups User:Thelmadatter#Medical_English_Spring_2013 Thelmadatter (talk) 17:23, 22 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

When do they have to turn in their projects? JakobSteenberg (talk) 17:31, 22 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Here you say that the projects are on en.wiki but on your userpage you have the project listed as an effort to translate English to Spanish. Could you clarify what is happening? Thanks, I want to support this. Blue Rasberry (talk) 21:12, 22 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

For background, it's worth investing 20 minutes to watch Leigh's presentation at Wikimania 2012 at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wH-Gp4A3G8E (starts at 31:56) where she talks about her goals and methods. Her submission is documented at http://wikimania2012.wikimedia.org/wiki/Submissions/Experimenting_with_Wikipedia_at_a_Mexican_university as well. --RexxS (talk) 01:00, 23 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

600 words is quite a lot of content, specially for foreign-language students. This usually ends with students creating tons of not really relevant text, not really well sourced content. For 600 words they should actually use( and previously understand) around 20 references (rough estimation), and 20 secondary refs in English for a Spanish speaking person is really a lot (I am Spanish and not a doctor, so I know what I am speaking about).

Moreover: most of the articles you have proposed are in line with other educational assingments were they create really secondary topics that serve nothing more than to end in the dark corners of the wiki and nobody ever updates again...

A proposal: get the students to improve the referencing and content of the parent articles of the ones you initially proposed them to writte. So for example instead of creating Efforts to change the obesity in Mexico, improve Obesity in Mexico, which is actually already absolutely abandoned, very very low importance and very very low quality.Instead of writting nutrition transition in Mexico they could wikify nutrition transition, add further references and include a section for the Mexico case. Instead of creating Parkinson's disease gene therapy put them to improve parkinson's disease clinical research; a very badly sourced article with multiple issues... Otherwise some of your content may face deletion and any other content will be simply lost in the 4m articles on enwiki. I would also recommend that you halved the number of words and on the other hand doubled the effort in the use of sources and quality of text.

Bests.--Garrondo (talk) 20:20, 22 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I think it's more of a translation effort: User:Thelmadatter#Articles_being_translated_from_en.wiki_to_es.wiki, unless I'm missing something. Biosthmors (talk) 21:53, 22 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think that Garrondo's source-length calculation is valid. Thyrotoxic periodic paralysis is about 1,600 words and has only 13 sources—and half of those are citations to historically important primary sources, not "real" sources. If an FA can be that length with basically six sources, I don't see any reason why someone couldn't write half as much with only a couple of good sources. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:17, 22 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

As far as I have understood it has both aims: translation and writting (which makes sense in a medical English course). See User:Thelmadatter/Sandboxes_Group_1 and User:Thelmadatter/Sandboxes_Group_2, and above he asked for help with the second aim. --Garrondo (talk) 06:47, 23 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Regarding number of sources and words: my message is that maybe writting 600 words for foreing students on highly technical topics in medicine may be too ambitious. Even if it is not maybe the topics chosen are not the best and maybe instead of centering efforts in increasing quantity in non-existing articles it would be more interesting for both his students and the encyclopedia to center efforts in improving quality in already existing topics. --Garrondo (talk) 06:47, 23 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

There have been two assignments for the semester. One was to translate an article from English to Spanish, which has been completed. What we are doing now is creating new articles. I tried to steer students to doing biographies and articles about medical institutions, primarily because these are topics I can (more easily) give feedback on. I did not go for improving articles because articles from scratch are easier to assess and make sure that students are doing the kind and amount of work needed to get something out of the assignment. I dont agree that 600 words is too ambitious as that is not even enough to do a decent biography of many, if not most, notable people. These are final projects for the semester. Our last class is May 8, but I can extend that for a few days afterwards for those who need the extra time. So they have over two weeks. I had them do an annotated bibliography to get them to assess their sources, making sure they had information and avoided primary source information. This week they are starting outlines. The one about the embryonic germ disc is problematic because the student jumped ahead of the game, writing something I have a very hard time understanding and when I looked around the web to figure out what he is writing about, I found germ layer which seems too similar.

A number of the selections are quite good... San Hipolito Hospital, video games for training surgeons, smallpox in Mexico are all topics that can be researched well within the guidelines and I can easily give feedback on. Its the highly technical topics that are problematic. Thelmadatter (talk) 13:37, 23 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

@Garrondo... The articles are in sandboxes and some of them may indeed be merged into existing articles as you suggest rather than into their own articles.Thelmadatter (talk) 13:44, 23 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Biographies and organizations like Red Cross of Mexico would certainly be easier than writing an article on a truly technical subject. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:37, 23 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

"I did not go for improving articles because articles from scratch are easier to assess and make sure that students are doing the kind and amount of work needed to get something out of the assignment." The problem is that what makes life easier for you and the students (self-contained piece of work) makes life harder for us (deletion/merge discussion followed by merge into existing articles if required) and stressful (articles nominated for deletion perhaps). It also goes against the whole purpose of the site, which isn't distinct articles written independently and as a one-off, but a hyper-linked collaborative encyclopaedia where existing material is improved as well as added to over time by multiple authors. This approach has a tendency to create tangential orphan articles that become abandoned, repeat existing material, confuse the reader and builds up a debt of rationalisation/re-organisation. But you are not alone in this approach and working out how students can improve the encyclopaedia rather than just add bits (of varying quality) to it is a hard problem. If you can consider how you might in future set assignments that build on and are incorporated into existing articles, it would be wonderful, and worth sharing with others. Colin°^Talk 12:10, 24 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

While I understand your point of view as a Wikipedian, the kind of modification work you request would require a committed response/help from the community, especially WP:MED as you have more requirements than the rest of Wikipedia. Education projects are based on article writing, not collaborating with other Wikipedians because there is no way to assure that volunteers will collaborate at all, never mind within the time constraints of a course. Please see [3]. For this reason and the others I stated, it is impossible to do the kind of work you request. The sandbox concept exists because of some of the problems you state. It allows students (and others) to develop articles apart from the mainspace and to put it there when it is good enough,avoiding deletion. there is no guarantee that the work being done in the sandboxes will wind up in the mainspace, although that is the goal. It depends on how well the students do.Thelmadatter (talk) 16:21, 24 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

What you are proposing seems likely to do good and unlikely to do anything bad, so I support your effort and am grateful for it. I would give any professor this support, but I am especially pleased with you because I am aware of the time you have spent coming to understand the community structure here.

I cannot promise that Wikipedians will ever support this class or any other but I can promise to promote your future classes if you want more community review, and I can say that I think that it is likely that you would get support if you wanted it. You are currently hosting your class on your userpage, but we actually have automated templates for professors which are intended to make it easier for them to monitor all the students' work and to allow Wikipedians to support the class. This board would be very positive about supporting your class if your class wanted feedback or technical assistance, and there are other dependable processes for seeking community review also. I would be interested in tracking your successes because professors promoting health topics in multiple languages are very aligned with Wikipedia goals.

I really appreciate your interest. Your translations are invaluable and your classes new articles are almost certainly much better than the new articles coming from any other source. I would like to see you continue to manage your class's Wikipedia project as you like and feel very welcome and appreciated to do so. Blue Rasberry (talk) 17:24, 24 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

My main concern is not the collaboration but that these assignments are focused on new articles only, because it makes marking easy. I don't think this is scalable and is already leading to problems. As you point out, some of the Education Programme material encourages this thinking. I don't agree with it. Colin°^Talk 17:57, 24 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Creating articles that don't exist, but definitely should exist (like an article over one of the biggest medicine-related charities in Mexico, which is proposed for this class) is not going to make anything difficult for us at all. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:31, 24 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

What is your point, WhatamIdoing? What you've said may be factually true for that article, but doesn't change the point I'm making. Garrondo's suggestions have been rejected apparently because they make marking harder and the assignment scope harder to define. The Obesity in Mexico example is a no-brainer and is an Afd/Merge waiting to happen. Colin°^Talk 21:50, 24 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Most of the articles in this case aren't likely to get merged or deleted, including Obesity in Mexico, which is definitely not a candidate for a deletion/AFD. We've already got 26 articles in Category:Obesity by country. If someone wants to have a go at writing a better version of one of those in his sandbox, then that's okay. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:08, 24 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

(outdent) Re-read Garrondo's post above. The existing article is Obesity in Mexico. The proposed one is Efforts to change the obesity in Mexico. In addition to the three of Garrondo's examples, we also have

• Embryonic heart vs Embryology of the heart
• Management of HIV/AIDS vs HIV Treatment Guidelines
• Liver#Cell types vs Liver Cytology
• General medical examination vs Well-woman examination
• Microcirculation vs Capillary exchange
• Add to Parathyroid gland or Organ transplantation before creating Parathyroid transplant surgery
• Human embryogenesis vs Embryology development of the first month
• Add to Serious game before creating Serious games for surgery
• Various articles deal with smallpox in Mexico vs Introduction of smallpox in Mexico
• Inner ear#Embryology vs Ear embryology
• Nicotine withdrawal already exists
• Arguably Medical student needs its own article even before creating Stress in medical students.

I think the case is strong that all these proposed articles either repeat existing content or would have been better added as new content into existing articles (first -- with the creation of new material only when it gets too much for the parent article). There are certainly deletion/merge discussions pending if these were to be created as new articles. Colin°^Talk 06:43, 25 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Moreover: while anybody is free to choose the articles they want to improve I always thought that one of educational assingments aims was to receive feedback from other editors. This is harder the darker the article so if less obscure subjects are choosen collaboration from other editors is likely to increase.

On the other hand I hope my comments were not taken as a critique. I said this specially since in this specific case the educator was an experienced wikipedian, so I thought he is fully qualified to fullfill both his educational efforts and improve a bit more the encyclopedia with only a slightly bigger effort.

As a consensus proposal for this term or other future terms could be that students wrote the specific articles as subsections of already existing articles instead of separated articles. If I were the instructor (which I am not, so take this with a grain of salt) I would give this 75% of the final marks, with the other 25% given to improving the already existing parts of the article, including a summary of the section in the lead, and even creating a single summary sentence that would be integrated at an even more general level. In the specific case of Obesity measures in Mexico: in this case I would specifically write the article inside Obesity in Mexico as a subsection, wich would be 75% of the marks, the other 25 would go to improving the overall article (which would be easily done with references used for the specific section) and I would even create a single sentence to include in the Obesity article if adequate.

To end I only want to strain that I admire the courage of educators (and specially this case, where the teacher knows wikipedia ways), that this was only a proposal for getting the best from the assingment both for the students and the wiki, and that as an Spanish editor interested in medicine the teacher can count with me to comment on students articles, whichever they finally are.

--Garrondo (talk) 07:24, 25 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

For now, I will have students continue working on their articles in the sandboxes. As they are short (600 or 1200 words depending on if done alone or in pairs), we may very well wind up simply adding the information into currently existing articles. Nicotine withdrawal is being rewritten and expanded. Microcirculation and embryonic heart can certainly fall into that category too. I may well be an experienced Wikipedian but Im not a medical professional. My med English students are Wikipedia novices. While we did what we could to avoid the same topics under different names, obviously we are not perfect. As I am seeing how the obesity article is shaping up off wiki, it is likely his information will be merged to the already existing article (probably by me). I disagree with the assessment of the smallpox article as its introduction in Mexico had very significant historical consequences. I believe the well-woman exam deserves its own article. If we can have an article on Bullying in medicine I think we can have one on stress in medical students. The serious game article is already long enough, another 1,200 words just on surgurical applications and nothing else (like flight training) would cause problems like WP:Undue. As a language teacher, I have to focus on the production of language. Simply adding citations or corrections does not meet the requirements of the course goals.Thelmadatter (talk) 02:51, 26 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I'd like to request your permission to elevate the importance of this article (Alpins method of astigmatism analysis) from low to mid priority (as Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Medicine appears to have made the original assignment). The article fits the definition for mid priority: "Normal priority for article improvement. A good article would be interesting or useful to many readers. Subject is notable within its particular specialty. This category includes most medical conditions, tests, approved drugs, medical subspecialties, well-known anatomy, and common signs and symptoms."

The Alpins Method is notable in its particular specialties: refractive, cataract, and corneal surgery. Groups of ophthalmologists devote themselves solely to these specific individual areas, such that they refer to themselves as a refractive surgeon, a cataract surgeon, or a corneal surgeon. Each of these areas also have societies and journals devoted specifically to the respective areas. The American Academy of Ophthalmology acknowledges these subspecialty areas (http://www.aao.org/careers/envision/subspecialties.cfm).^[1]

The Alpins Method is of clear importance to these specialists, and is used daily in their professional lives by many.

Thank you. Kcroes (talk) 21:50, 22 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

This article seems very narrowly-focused, but I agree that the importance scale indicates it should be classified as "mid". I'll change the assessment, but will not be wounded if someone corrects me (as has been said before, the best way to learn the right answer is to post the wrong answer in a public place).  Done -- Scray (talk) 23:07, 22 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It's worth remembering that the "importance" of an article is only a way for a Wikiproject to determine which articles are its priority for working on. It has no currency beyond a Wikiproject, so when you want to work on a given article, it will be "top importance" for you, even though a particular Wikiproject may not have the same priorities (as reflected in the definitions that you looked at). --RexxS (talk) 01:13, 23 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks to both of you. I appreciate the clarification regarding the meaning of assigned "importance" levels. Kcroes (talk) 02:20, 23 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The tool for checking how many users watch a given WikiProject has been updated to show how many of them are active on Wikipedia. It now says that WikiProject Medicine ranks as #4 by number of active Wikipedians with this page on their watch list. More popular are military history, video games, and mathematics. Blue Rasberry (talk) 20:25, 23 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

A large number of articles under medicine portal are about conditions or disorders with multiple names. These articles start with a long list of these alternative names, which is actually ridiculous when you just want to know what the disease is. Many readers must be having to get through large bold-letter lines until they reach the definition of condition. Example 1, Example 2

I think these articles should have a multiple nomenclature infobox situated just above regular medicine infobox. To increase the readability of medicine infobox, this (multiple nomenclature) infobox should be collapsed by default. The standard nomenclature included in first line/intro/definition should be the one from article heading. (Although many articles have eponyms as article headings, which should actually also be standardized). Other terms will be enlisted in multiple nomenclature infobox.

Do you think this is a good idea? Saurabh P. (talk) 02:43, 24 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I think it is a bad idea to have more than one infobox. I do not see having a couple of names listed to be a big deal. I think it is silly to list variations in spelling. We could add this to the disease infobox.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 06:58, 24 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Right! It would be great to add parameter |other_names= to {{Infobox disease}} and the articles can be re-edited as required. As Wavelength suggested Current Medical Terminology or International Classification of Diseases can be used for standard names of articles. How do we proceed? ——★Saurabh P.  |  ☎ talk 07:23, 25 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Per James, overlong lists of alternative names could be shrunk by excluding minor variations. I think significantly different names should be mentioned in the first, defining, sentence. A lot of people never look at infoboxes, and moving the alternatives out of the first sentence would remove them from the snippet in the Google result, which I often don't go past if I just want a definition. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 07:40, 24 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Yes just the major names in the lead with the rest going in the section on society and culture.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 08:20, 24 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I tend to include spelling variations in the list of synonyms, as you commonly see this done on medical pages. Are we not supposed to do this? I didn't find any guidance in the MEDMOS one way or the other. According to the main MOS: "If the subject of the page has a common abbreviation or more than one name, the abbreviation (in parentheses) and each additional name should be in boldface on its first appearance." and later "significant alternative names for the topic should be mentioned in the article, usually in the first sentence or paragraph. These may include alternative spellings, longer or shorter forms, historical names, and significant names in other languages." ...although the wording isn't very definitive either. Lesion (talk) 10:24, 24 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Isn't this what redirects are for? Put the main name(s) in the article. Put redirects or soft redirects from the more obscure ones.LeadSongDog come howl! 19:32, 24 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I think that when we list all the names, the readers are more confident that they're in the right place. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:37, 24 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It would be easy enough to add a parameter for |other_names= to {{Infobox disease}}. We'd also agreed at one point that it would be desirable to add |specialty= to that (as in "cardiology" for various heart diseases and "pediatrics" for childhood diseases), but I don't think that anything happened there. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:35, 24 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

See JAMA Network | JAMA | Standard Medical Terminology. There can be a standardized name for the article title, and a list of alternative names in a hatnote or an info box or the first sentence or (if there are many alternative names) a separate paragraph.

—Wavelength (talk) 20:01, 24 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

...at Chronic cerebrospinal venous insufficiency and its talkpage. LeadSongDog come howl! 05:59, 24 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you. LeadSongDog come howl! 19:27, 24 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

A new Wikipedian, Michael Castleman, has asked for comment at Talk:Premature ejaculation#Replacement of most of the current article. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 03:57, 25 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Daria Cybulska of Wikimedia UK having two meetings which may interest members of this WikiProject. Those who live near London my even be interested in joining Daria as member of the Wikimedia community.

By coincidence, both the meetings are on the 3rd of May.

• Wellcome Collection meeting will look at options of future cooperation. e.g. opening up the collection to wikimedians and free knowledge

• Cancer Research UK will look at their recent external funding bid for a Wikimedian in Residence and see how we can improve it.

See wmuk:Water cooler#Wellcome Collection and CRUK meetings

Yaris678 (talk) 17:21, 25 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I am looking for information on medical applications of breathing gas recycling. Can anyone point me to relevant sources and, if they exist, Wikipedia articles? • • • Peter (Southwood) ^(talk): 20:50, 25 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I just chanced across an article about a non-mainstream child birth practice, lotus birth, which was in the state of an incredibly tendentious fringe-pushing advocacy screed due to what appears to be the years-long work of a single-purpose account [4]. Since I couldn't find any old edit unaffected by this advocacy campaign all the way back through 2006, I pulled the emergency brake and stubbed the article back to a one-sentence stub. Competent help in reconstructing it would be appreciated. Fut.Perf. ☼ 06:30, 26 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Seems quite extreme. I'm not sure if such an emergency stubbing was necessary. There are plenty of books on the subject and the article had references. a dramatic pruning - yes - but a 1 sentence stub (and a claim of no sources, when you didn't even copy over the sources that were cited) - is not very fair. --Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 06:41, 26 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Well, feel free to rebuild, with whatever of the sources may have met WP:MEDRS. I did not have the time to go through the article and check what was salvagable in detail, but I do maintain that temporarily having only a one-sentence stub (or indeed having no article at all) will be better than having the article as it was when I found it. Fut.Perf. ☼ 06:46, 26 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Wait, why would all sources have to meet WP:MEDRS?? The older version of the article I read was just as much about the social practice as it was the medicine. If medical claims are being made, I understand a higher standard, but not for all claims in such an article. "I did not have the time to go through the article and check what was salvagable in detail," - then revert to an older version, don't just ice the whole thing... Or, if you don't have time, start a discussion on the talk page. Do you realize this page has been around since 2004? --Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 06:53, 26 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It doesn't need a discussion to determine that the article in its present state was unacceptable. Yes, I know the article has been around for a long time. Which makes things worse. The alternatives at this point are simple: (a) have a newly written, neutral article (best solution). (b) find an old revision in the edit history unaffected by the POV-pushing and revert to that (perhaps an acceptable solution). (c) have only a one-sentence stub (not very good). (d) Leave article as it was (completely unacceptable). Hence, the article after my edit is better than it was before. Fut.Perf. ☼ 06:57, 26 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Hmmm, not sure that it's entirely fair to characterise this as the work of an SPA, but it's clearly problematic. The broader rubric seems to be feminist anthropology, though xhe has edited most extensively around childbirth-related topics. It might be best though if an admin with more obviously clean hands were to review the block. "Seen to be done" etc. LeadSongDog come howl! 16:03, 26 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]