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Redirect

There is a proposal to delete this redirect. Wondering others thoughts? [1] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 09:14, 28 August 2016 (UTC)

[2]--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 09:41, 28 August 2016 (UTC)
It's already been deleted. Again, because the excuse given is a RFD discussion from June, in which nobody participating seems to know much about medicine.
"Clear liquids" (in the plural) is a typical phrase for referring to a clear liquid diet, and I don't expect it to be used often in the sense of merely a transparent liquid (a significant concern at the prior RFD). A search on the quoted phrase turns up 13 hits, at least 11 of which are references to a clear liquid diet. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:06, 28 August 2016 (UTC)

Recreate

Should we recreate the redirect from Clear_liquids to Liquid diet#Clear

  • Support recreation of link as the first is a very common name of the second. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:57, 29 August 2016 (UTC)
  • The correct place to have this discussion should be WP:DRV. You're thinking from a medical perspective, but for me, clear liquids are literally any liquid that is clear. It doesn't necessarily refer to a liquid diet. Honestly, I'd be fine with the redirect if someone could explain the usage of the term at liquid diet. Right now, it's not even mentioned, making confusing for our non-medical readers like myself. -- Tavix (talk) 01:42, 29 August 2016 (UTC)
User: Tavix did you ever have a flu and were told to "drink clear liquids"? This is incredibly common in the US, at least when I was growing up (and apparently today; I don't hang out with people with kids or who are otherwise vulnerable to flu) Jytdog (talk) 06:09, 30 August 2016 (UTC)
  • Note from admin deleting the recreated redirect: there was a deletion discussion with clear consensus to delete, and the article was recreated quickly after. As per the deletion discussion, the current situation is confusing - the term is 'general', and could mean anything (at the moment I am staring at two bottles of clear liquid at my desk, I will not discuss my further dietary issues, if any, on Wikipedia), and where it redirects to is not clearly stating that the term is really so commonly used for that specific use.
As Tavix here is saying, the correct pathway would have been a WP:DRV. --Dirk Beetstra T C 04:56, 29 August 2016 (UTC)
Thanks. Will start the discussion at WP:DRV Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 07:32, 29 August 2016 (UTC)
Doc James, please tell me once you've done so. The deletion is frankly ridiculous and this is a clear example of WP:Bureaucracy gone awry. Carl Fredrik 💌 📧 13:43, 29 August 2016 (UTC)
User:CFCF if you could begin the process that would be great. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 13:51, 29 August 2016 (UTC)
  • Beetstra is correct here; a local consensus can not overturn a community wide decision. That decision happened here. While I am confident this project is well meaning, it can not overturn that decision. As noted, WP:DRV is the way forward. --Hammersoft (talk) 15:28, 29 August 2016 (UTC)
    Beestra is a long way from correct here. There is no way forward via WP:DRV and I'd be amazed if you both of you didn't know it. DRV is only useful in practice when the closer made a mistake in assessing consensus (which was 7-0 in favour of deletion on 18 June 2016), or when something new has arisen since the debate. Since neither of those are true, why are you suggesting wasting folks' time with a pointless DRV? The only way that a recreated redirect stands any chance of being kept is if the article Liquid diet is expanded to clearly explain that 'clear liquids' has a significant use as a phrase relevant to a liquid diet - preferably with good sourcing. Once that has happened, the arguments presented at Wikipedia:Redirects_for_discussion/Log/2016_June_11#Clear_liquids are superseded to some extent and it would be worth recreating the redirect once more, IMHO. Only then would DRV be useful, should the redirect be deleted again. --RexxS (talk) 16:47, 29 August 2016 (UTC)
To further RexxS's argument see the multiple discussions at User talk:Beetstra. Carl Fredrik 💌 📧 16:54, 29 August 2016 (UTC)
(edit conflict)I think it's clear (no pun intended) that new information has come to light since the closure of the RFD, so a DRV could prove fruitful. At the RFD, there was no discussion about how it's used as a common synonym, just a bunch of editors agreeing with me that "clear liquids" is a vague phrase that doesn't necessarily refer to a "clear liquid diet." I do agree that the term should be discussed and sourced there though. -- Tavix (talk) 16:59, 29 August 2016 (UTC)
  • RexxS, I'm quite aware of other paths. However, given the reality that ambiguity isn't going away, DRV is the only way forward if it is to be a redirect to the diet. I didn't mean to imply that it had a high chance of success. In fact, it has an extremely low chance of success. The deletion discussion ran its proper course, had enough people contributing to it, was properly closed by an uninvolved administrator, and was properly acted on. DRV would likely snow oppose a DRV over it. As to ambiguity; did you know that "clear liquid" can refer to cocaine in liquid form? Did you know that "clear liquid" emanating from the breast can be an indicator of prolactinoma? Did you know that "clear liquid" may refer to mucus and stomach acid emanating from the body in the form of vomit after all food has been expelled? Did you know that grain alcohol is a clear liquid? And on and on and on. Having "clear liquid" default to a form of diet is dramatically inappropriate. At best, I could see a disambiguation page. --Hammersoft (talk) 17:58, 29 August 2016 (UTC)
  • For "an extremely low chance of success", I think you mean "zero chance of success"? And I am indeed aware of other uses of "clear liquids" (note the plural). Nevertheless, there's no point in proposing an entry on Wikipedia unless there's decent sourcing for it. If there's sufficient to establish separate notability, then let's have an article. If there's just enough to make reasonable entry in another article, then let's have a redirect to it. Of course, if there are sufficiently well sourced examples of multiple meanings, then by all means let's have a dab page. However, inappropriate as it may be, if there's only one sourced target for a redirect, you can't have a dab page with only article to navigate to, sorry. --RexxS (talk) 18:32, 29 August 2016 (UTC)
  • You can create the dab if you think your sources are good enough to fill out the articles you want to point to. If there is only one properly sourced target, then a dab page would not be viable, but a redirect would be perfectly appropriate. --RexxS (talk) 20:38, 29 August 2016 (UTC)
  • No, it isn't, and per the prior deletion discussion it would be speedy deleted, as has already happened three times. It is highly inadvisable to recreate it, yet again, without seeking a new consensus to override the existing one. --Hammersoft (talk) 22:37, 29 August 2016 (UTC)
    • DRV handles cases in which "significant new information has come to light since a deletion that would justify recreating the deleted page". "Come to light" probably covers cases in which none of the participants knew the information, even though it's easily available (just put "clear liquids" (don't forget the plural) into your favorite search engine, and see how long it takes to get past webpages about colonoscopy prep and surgery). So technically it is possible for DRV to handle this. It's probably worth jumping through the hoop. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:56, 29 August 2016 (UTC)
i did. Jytdog (talk) 06:19, 30 August 2016 (UTC)
@CFCF: Calling someone "entirely ignorant" is a direct violation of WP:NPA. Comment on content, not the person saying it. --Hammersoft (talk) 15:49, 31 August 2016 (UTC)
@Hammersoft: If someone is demonstrably unaware of a meaning, then I can't see how calling them "entirely ignorant" of it is a personal attack. You need to be a lot less quick to take offence and AGF a little more. Comment on facts, not your interpretations. --RexxS (talk) 23:44, 31 August 2016 (UTC)
  • Text based communication has serious limitations. A person posting should be more careful than that in their choice of words. Quoting WP:NPA: "Additionally, because Wikipedia discussions are in a text-only medium, nuances and emotions are often conveyed poorly which can easily lead to misunderstanding" This isn't a me problem. It's a CFCF problem. The point here is for CFCF to be aware of the policy. This has been done. --Hammersoft (talk) 00:07, 1 September 2016 (UTC)
I agree. It lead to your misunderstanding. --RexxS (talk) 00:19, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

Merge parasuicide and suicide attempt?

Not really seeing how these are different apart from in name. The first article could pretty much be whittled down to a single sentence and merged with the article on suicide attempt. Do you agree? Carl Fredrik 💌 📧 15:08, 31 August 2016 (UTC)

yes, they could be merged...IMO--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 19:19, 31 August 2016 (UTC)
Agree. Propose the merge and see if anybody raises a fuss. —Shelley V. Adams ‹blame
credit› 02:09, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

Phobia article

One being discussed here Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Chaetophobia Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 22:37, 26 August 2016 (UTC)

And 5 more AFDs on obscure Greek terms coined for various specific phobias are also open, listed at WP:WikiProject Psychology/Article alerts. —PermStrump(talk) 02:14, 27 August 2016 (UTC)

We appear to have dozens if not hundreds of phobia articles. Rather than doing each one separately. Maybe we can just develop consensus here to merge them all to List of phobias? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 21:06, 27 August 2016 (UTC)

  • Support merging or redirecting to List of phobias. I don't think anyone should spend time merging more than a one sentence translation/description. I bet most of these terms are already on that list and can be deleted and redirected without anyone worrying about merging the content, IMO. —PermStrump(talk) 01:25, 28 August 2016 (UTC)
Pinging Mangoe who might be interested in this discussion since Mangoe has initiated AFDs for a ton of these phobias recently. Side note, I PRODed Cleithrophobia yesterday and I'm mentioning it here because I'll probably forget about it by tomorrow and if consensus is to merge/redirect these to List of phobias, maybe someone else will notice this comment and make sure that page is pointing to the right place too. :) —PermStrump(talk) 01:32, 28 August 2016 (UTC)

Recent articles

Looking at medical students "The participants valued lecture notes (73.7%) and Wikipedia (74%) as their most important online sources for knowledge acquisition."[4] and "Residents reported utilizing online resources on average 68 % of the time, in comparison to 32 % on average for printed materials. Residents reported UpToDate, PubMed, and Wikipedia as the most visited websites and ranked each highly but for different purposes."[5] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:42, 26 August 2016 (UTC)

Is this something to cheer about or to shake in fear about? Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 19:45, 26 August 2016 (UTC)
I remember my lecture notes from many years back. They were in great need of some "citation needed" tags.
This is more something to make note of as we work to improve WP's medical content. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:56, 26 August 2016 (UTC)
This makes me think that we always want good information, of course, but also we could also help these students and other healthcare professionals by making an extra effort to provide plain-English explanations (to model good communication) and covering the aspects that don't get emphasis in textbooks for future physicians (e.g., the emotional challenges for some diagnoses, self-care and how to live with a particular condition, non-physician resources such as occupational therapy ...given the diversity of conditions, the list is long). WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:55, 28 August 2016 (UTC)
The second article is specifically about psychiatry residents. Definitely going to email it to a program director I know. Maybe I should note that I'm one of the people who edit Wikipedia's psychiatry articles and ask him whether it's reason to cheer or fear. —Shelley V. Adams ‹blame
credit› 02:33, 1 September 2016 (UTC)
Currently teaching a team of 3rd-year medical students on the wards, I asked them during our first session (a few days ago) about the sources they use. They reported that it depends on topic; generally, they start with UpToDate but have been admonished by other faculty that it's only a starting point, like Wikipedia (they were clearly reluctant to mention WP but relieved when I did not snort). I enjoyed that, and as we discussed further they were able to describe how they seek sources that we would consider MEDRS, as time permits. Though a very small sample, their responses line up with other medical students I've taught (we do have an informatics curriculum). — soupvector (talk) 04:00, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

List people who are on oxygen

Discussion here [6] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 06:56, 1 September 2016 (UTC)


give opinion(gave mine)--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 10:46, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

RfC on sources for nutritionist

See Talk:Michael_Greger#Request_for_comments_on_SBM_source Jytdog (talk) 03:07, 1 September 2016 (UTC)


more opinions(gave mine)--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 10:55, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

Lifestyle medicine

here is a truly bad article. Jytdog (talk) 07:02, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

The American College of Lifestyle Medicine was formed in Loma Linda in 2004, ref. Jytdog (talk) 08:04, 1 September 2016 (UTC)
Merge any worthwhile information into Behavioral medicine? —Shelley V. Adams ‹blame
credit› 12:28, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

Rui L. Reis

Dear medical experts: I move this draft to mainspace because the subject was obviously notable. However, this fellow has his finger in so many pies that it was hard to find sources that weren't connected with him in some way. The article could use a going-over from someone with more knowledge of medical research.—Anne Delong (talk) 04:20, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

[7]was taken care of (Jytdog)--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 10:52, 1 September 2016 (UTC)
Well, I figured it needed trimming somewhat, maybe some of the awards and details about his projects; that's why I posted a request here. I did expect, however, that editors here would use medical or academic sources to which I have no access to provide references for some of the information, not just delete it all, including standard stuff such as his education, academic history, books, selected highly cited papers, and even the section headings. It's unlikely that a researcher could accrue 30,000 citations without at least a few of them verifying information about him. It's obvious that no one even looked; the mass removal of content began 12 minutes after I posted here. As to why I moved it to mainspace, Jytdog, AfC instructions say to do that with any draft that has at least a 50% chance of surviving an AfD. I spent considerable time on this article and it appears it was wasted, so I can't bring myself to leave my usual "thank you" post.—Anne Delong (talk) 16:18, 1 September 2016 (UTC)
WP:SELFPUB allows editors to cite works from the subject on uncontroversial information about themselves. Sizeofint (talk) 17:46, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

Mitragyna speciosa

Mitragyna speciosa

Needs semi protection. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 07:34, 1 September 2016 (UTC)


secondary source opinions(gave mine)--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 10:18, 2 September 2016 (UTC)

EpiPen pricing controversy

Epi-Pen 2016

The EpiPen is the treatment for anaphylaxis which can be fatal; kids with allergies carry them around in their backpacks. Mylan, which is the only company who makes it, has raised the price from <$100 to >$600 since 2007 for no reason other than profit. As a result it's hard for the uninsured to afford, putting lives at risk. There's been a burst of media coverage over the last few days, reminiscent of Daraprim and Martin Shkreli. Currently there's nothing about this in the article on Mylan. There is some material at EpiPen but perhaps not enough. I've already found some good sources; see Talk:Mylan/Archives/2016#EpiPen_pricing_controversy. Am happy to do more but very busy for now; maybe someone will be interested in the meantime. --Middle 8 (t • c | privacy • COI) 07:39, 23 August 2016 (UTC)

added here [8] EpiPen and to Mylan/talk for references--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 10:58, 23 August 2016 (UTC)

Great 5 page article on history of medicine: James Crossley Eno and the Rise of the Health Salts Trade.

Came across this working on the article about Eno's.

So well written and stuff I knew nothing about; one of the roots of patent medicines that the pharma industry eventually grew out of.

W. A. Campbell (June, 1966) James Crossley Eno and the Rise of the Health Salts Trade. University Of Newcastle Upon Tyne Medical Gazette 60(3):350. Reprinted as an appendix - pp 259ff in W. A. Campbell. The Analytical Chemist In Nineteenth Century English Social History Thesis presented for the degree of Master of Letters in the University of Durham. Newcastle upon Tyne July 1971

-- Jytdog (talk) 07:36, 2 September 2016 (UTC)

very informative--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 10:19, 2 September 2016 (UTC)
plus ça change ... I love the insight of one of the spa entrepreneurs that providing an environment where the wealthy worried well could continue an indulgent lifestyle (while fancying it was healthy), was a money spinner. I believe in some countries (e.g. France) "taking the waters" at a Spa is still a government reimbursable treatment. Alexbrn (talk) 10:30, 2 September 2016 (UTC)
germany too! Baden this, Baden that. Jytdog (talk) 10:43, 2 September 2016 (UTC)

Merge WP:VET to WP:MED as a taskforce/workgroup?

The result is Oppose, with the caveat that per WAID's analysis there may technically be almost no one to !vote from WP:VET. In any case consent by the members of WP:VET would be required for this, and that consent clearly does not existJytdog (talk) 16:53, 2 September 2016 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

WP:WikiProject Veterinary Medicine seems to be almost completely moribund as a wikiproject, though work on articles continues. I think it would be beneficial to merge that project to WP:WikiProject Medicine as a taskforce (workgroup), since there are more centralized, active resources here (article peer review, etc.). Given that this is largely up to participants at WP:VET whether they want to fold in, I've posted the main discussion at its talk page here (for an article merge, we would usually discuss at the target not source page). Given that discussion ended up starting here not there, I reversed the pointers, so this is the main thread now.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼  07:40, 26 August 2016 (UTC)

Did you mean to say that WP:VET is moribund? —PermStrump(talk) 08:01, 26 August 2016 (UTC)
Right! Fixed it above. Derp.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼  06:02, 27 August 2016 (UTC)
User:SMcCandlish would be happy to see that as a task force. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 20:07, 26 August 2016 (UTC)
  • Strong Oppose - moribund is not a sufficient reason to put this into place - potential confusion between medicine and veterinary medicine beggars belief what might be misconstrued in the long run. The benefits of becoming part of this project is insufficiently explained or reasoned, and the independence of the veterinary project should be maintained despite a quiet stage. If in the eventuality of related but not the same subject area appropriations like this occur, it will make a complete mockery of the project system in wikipedia. If it seems my complaint is not understood, try showing me a well reasoned explanation of the mess of the maritime, ships, nautical project shifts and changes in the last ten years. JarrahTree 00:48, 29 August 2016 (UTC)
I commend Whatamidoing's response here at the vetmed talk page, and commend her civility and effort to explain. I understand her point of view, and it has been well explained. Thanks for that. JarrahTree 06:43, 29 August 2016 (UTC)

*Strong oppose as per Montanabw and Atsme. DrChrissy (talk) 18:59, 30 August 2016 (UTC)

Just a note that the medicine article actually lists vet-med us a sub-specialty of medicine. Kingofaces43 (talk) 16:32, 2 September 2016 (UTC)
  • Oppose, as a veterinarian that occasionally writes wiki articles, the fields of vet med and human medicine are different, and vet med deserves its own project. But I have no objection if members of Project Medicine wish to collaborate with or join Vet Med- the "One Health" initiative and all. Froggerlaura ribbit 00:14, 31 August 2016 (UTC)
    • It's not a question of whether the subjects are similar, or anything like that. It's a question of whether there are editors there. To quote the definition from WP:WikiProject, A WikiProject is a group of contributors who want to work together as a team to improve Wikipedia.. No people, no WikiProject. Conversely, it's okay to have multiple groups working on the same subject. Three separate teams = three separate WikiProjects, even if all three happen to claim "horses" as their area of interest. WhatamIdoing (talk) 11:52, 31 August 2016 (UTC)
      Actually I'd disagree with that. They are very different and require different kinds of expertise. If editors want to work on one or the other that's fine but perhaps the project itself should have its own integrity. and be led by those with more experience and expertise in the area. I also agree that a takeover of the vet med project is probably not a good idea. (Desclaimer: I have worked a little in animal related articles because I love animals but have never signed up for the vet med project) Wikipedia actually changes quite quickly so if the project is there perhaps vets and other interested editors may come. (Leave it and they will come.) We are less likely to attract animal specialists to the human medicine project.(Littleolive oil (talk) 19:26, 31 August 2016 (UTC))
      I don't see much practical point in disagreeing with the formal guidelines myself. A WikiProject is people. It's not "pages". It's not "an area". I quoted the actual definition on the English Wikipedia: A WikiProject is a social group. I agree that if a group of editors is active on that talk pages, that it might prove attractive to someone else, but it is not true that if neglected pages exist (which they still would, because task forces get separate pages, including talk pages, and all existing URLs would redirect there), then those inactive pages will prove attractive to newcomers. BTW, I have been watching WikiProjects for six or eight years now. In my experience, "build it (or leave it) and they will come" almost never works. In fact, it seems to work less well now than it used to, and it never worked well. We've had remarkably few successful (i.e., still active just one year later) WikiProjects created in the last couple of years. I can think of exactly two offhand. Nearly all of the new ones are started by one or two people with limited experience, in the hope that if the pages are there, then it will attract other editors. But that simply doesn't work. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:25, 1 September 2016 (UTC)
      I concede to your greater experience, but its not accurate or fair to say I am disagreeing with a formal guideline. I'm not. Projects have Wikipedia "space" and of course the projects are made up of editors what else could they be on this kind of collaborative system. Further, Vet med isn't a new project put together by some new inexperienced editor. There have been vets on Wikipedia and may be again and there are editors with experience both with animals and animal articles; I don't believe for one second they will go to human medicine to look for a vet med project. A more direct route for inclusion in a project is to have a project in place. Editors come and go all the time. We don't cancel something because an editor leaves; we wait for someone else to show up which often times they do. I didn't believe the projects should be merged, but having seen the cmt below by a vet its up to the more experienced people in this field to decide; I've stated my position and will bow out. (Littleolive oil (talk) 23:00, 1 September 2016 (UTC))
      I don't think you've thought this through completely. A WikiProject is people. People == WikiProject. No people == no WikiProject. We cannot "have a project in place" when the WikiProject (remember, that word means "people") is not there. You're saying "let's have people in place when there are no people in place". That's not logical.
      And on the second point, nobody would need to "go to human medicine to look for a vet med project". Users would search for WikiProject Veterinary medicine (the current page title), just like they [don't] now, and it would redirect elsewhere. WhatamIdoing (talk) 07:24, 2 September 2016 (UTC)
      You may be taking your thesis a little too far, WhatamIdoing. My view would be more like "a Wikiproject is a container for a group of editors". From that point of view, an empty container would still have the value of being capable of being refilled, without have to recreate the container. From what I've read in this thread, there's little point in trying to incorporate WPVET into WPMED, even temporarily, give the likelihood that editors interested in veterinary topics may wish to revive the project at some point. --RexxS (talk) 16:38, 2 September 2016 (UTC)
  • Oppose Not the same fields nor the same expertise.(Littleolive oil (talk) 01:43, 31 August 2016 (UTC))
  • Support Having veterinary experience and being a member there for about 2 years now, I think it would overall be beneficial to move vet med over to a task force. Veterinary medicine and human medicine are overall pretty similar in all the core concepts. Often times we're dealing with similar diseases and treatment methods. The only main difference is that vet med tackles multiple species (the reality ongoing joke is that med school is easier than vet school because of this). The closest fit otherwise would be in Wikiproject Agriculture, but not all vet med is in agriculture either. Vet Med was marked as inactive sometime ago, so it has reached the point where WhatamIdoing's comments are very valid with respect to scope not being the issue so much as activity. A taskforce under WikiProject Medicine would hopefully draw in more medical minded folks potentially interested in the topic. It's generally difficult to draw in agricultural editors from any specific area, so this proposal seems like the most beneficial option all-around. As a member, I'm really not seeing any significant justification amongst the opposes that would illustrate a consensus not to go ahead with the change. Kingofaces43 (talk) 18:12, 1 September 2016 (UTC)
  • Oppose Yes, WikiProjects are groups of people interested in collaboratively editing articles. I'd imagine that the group of editors interested in human medicine are not interested in veterinary medicine, and vice versa - which is why the two separate projects exist in the first place...because these are different groups of people who work on different types of articles. Trying to revive an inactive project with disinterested editors just for the purpose of watching for discussions doesn't seem like a good reason. If some WP:MED editors are interested in article alerts for veterinary medicine, they can do that at WP:VETMED. If a group of people want to revive WP:VETMED, then they can go ahead and do so. --Scott Alter (talk) 00:46, 2 September 2016 (UTC)
    • There's actually significant overlap. Veterinarians do a lot of public health work, because they know a lot about zoonotic diseases. They are involved in medical research. Even in a simple small-animal pet clinic, they also use many of the same treatments that are used in human healthcare.
      But none of that matters. What matters is "are there any people there right now, and do any of them object?" WhatamIdoing (talk) 07:24, 2 September 2016 (UTC)
      • If there is no one left, then there is no one able to object. Not having objections at VETMED would be the first step. However, there would be no benefit to WPMED and no reason to merge...it'd still be the same people with the same interests working on the same project. If the merged projects would have the same group of editors, then you'd need to ask WPMED if they are interested in expanding the scope of the project to include veterinary medicine. This is the second step. It seems like people from the the VETMED/animal projects are opposed to a merger, and it seems like people from WPMED are mixed on taking on veterinary medicine. I don't see any consensus here, and its leaning much more towards oppose. --Scott Alter (talk) 15:09, 2 September 2016 (UTC)
On the contrary, there doesn't seem to be much WP:CONSENSUS (i.e., we don't just count votes) leaning towards an oppose amongst us vet members. We're mostly seeing WP:JUSTDONTLIKEIT arguments and votes rather than solid justification for not going ahead with the change in terms of the guidance we have on dealing with inactive projects. Regardless of how many other members simply display opposition, we'd need some strong arguments based on our Wikiproject guidelines to say members are opposed in terms of consensus. I'm just not seeing that yet.Kingofaces43 (talk) 16:32, 2 September 2016 (UTC)

Information about merging WikiProjects

WikiProjects are people, not subject areas. The first thing that matters in these discussions is whether any people exist. We have some good data on the (in)activity for this WikiProject, so let's look at a few facts:

  • The last time anyone replied to any comment at that project's talk page (not counting the comments from the last few days, of course) was in 2014. Getting zero replies to all questions that were asked over the space of the last two years(!) is a pretty reliable sign of a dead project. If there were any editors who are actually trying to work together to improve articles (=the definition of a WikiProject), then you'd have expected someone to reply to at least some of those questions, or to talk to the other editors in the group, wouldn't you? But nobody did. So that's one indication that the group is dead.
  • There are allegations of "active editing" in the articles. However, if you look at the history of the stats we keep on article quality, there's been almost no change during the last couple of years. Relevant calculations such as User:WP 1.0 bot/WikiWork/om show almost no change (actually, some of them have shown an average worsening of the situation, but no more than you'd expect from a few more stubs getting tagged [by other editors] for the WikiProject).
  • As SMcCandlish noted, these decisions are made by the participants of the (two) affected projects – not random editors. In particular, participants in VETMED basically have veto rights. Who's a participant? A participant is someone who is trying to work with others on the articles of interest to the group.
    • A reasonable expectation is that any such participants will be actively editing that area. We have a complete, bot-generated list of all people (including IPs) who are actively editing in that area right here. (The list includes people who just happen to have made a few edits but aren't interested in working with others, so it is participants plus non-participants.) It's a short list, and at a quick glance, the only people who have joined this discussion and whose names are in that list are Doc James and SMcCandlish, and I don't believe that either of them claim to be VETMED participants. (Of course, please tell me if I missed your name.) That metric indicates that nobody here can claim to be an active participant in VETMED, and therefore that nobody's vote counts on behalf of VETMED (nor, of course, would mine).
    • You can also find participants by looking at membership lists, although they're notoriously incomplete and always out of date. Using that metric, User:Montanabw is at least a former participant in the project. If she's opposed, no matter why she's opposed, then it's probably worth respecting her opposition. She may want to WP:REVIVE it as an active group, which is just fine. If she changes her mind and decides that having someone else manage template hassles or other boring maintenance issues would free her up to do other things, then that's okay, too.

Now I've got no particular interest in this merge; I don't have strong opinions about it either way. The group is functionally dead at the moment, so the result just doesn't matter. From where I stand, WPMED won't get any benefit (e.g., new participants with new perspectives) and a merge probably wouldn't harm anyone (because VETMED's pages would get MOVEd into WPMED's "space", but probably still be just as dead as it's been for two years). So IMO WPMED can let it keep rotting on its own, or it can play caretaker for any administrative hassles (like removing the link to the list of recent changes from the top of its page, which hasn't worked since 2013) unless and until someone is interested in the subject in the future, so the outcome of this proposal just doesn't matter to me.

But the procedure matters a great deal to me. WikiProjects are social groups. It's no good trying to force someone to play with you. It doesn't work in the middle school lunchroom, and it doesn't work on Wikipedia. So let's let the actual participants in VETMED, if any current ones can be found, decide for themselves, without a bunch of non-participants trying to decide what they "ought" to want. My fellow WPMED folks who wish to express a POV are welcome to say whether you'd accept them, if they chose to join us. But let's please confine our (WPMEDders') comments to our own affairs. If anyone's active in VETMED (and perhaps just on vacation this week), then they don't need us to tell them what to do. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:08, 30 August 2016 (UTC)

I have posted messages at the various animal wikiprojects. The bottom line is that I and all the other editors can go join the wikiproject if it matters that much to you (and by the way, I'm a she, not a he, though it's not that big of a deal), but most of the articles tagged for vetmed are being worked on by the animal project editors, and we don't always go in and upgrade the assessments at talk where we maybe added some sources but still think the thing is C-class. There was a time (like 10 years ago when I started here) when there were several real vets on the project and a bit of implication that only real vets should join because -- someone worried about not giving out medical advice or who knows? But the point is, we don't delete or merge inactive members, and I would hate to see this project "downgraded" either -- a task force is a "child" project of a "parent,," not a question of active or inactive. This was an itch that no one needed to scratch and the wiki servers won't crash if it remains a stand-alone project. Someone will come along and revive it, eventually. Montanabw(talk) 23:46, 30 August 2016 (UTC)
Maybe this was a wake-up call? I'm ok with putting my name on the list if that's what we need to do but now I'm wondering...I just created an article and mentioned blister beetle poisoning as the cause of death for a notable horse, so for those instances, should I start adding a WPVET banner on the TP, or would it only apply to articles about vet meds or....? Atsme📞📧 00:14, 31 August 2016 (UTC)
I think we do need to start adding {{WikiProject Veterinary medicine}} assessments for health-related articles (such as blister beetles, but not individual horses that died from ingesting them). If its horse health, and you might call a vet, then yes. Montanabw(talk) 01:04, 31 August 2016 (UTC)
User:Atsme, the scope of a project is whatever the group decides. Most groups choose a scope that makes sense to other people, but that's not actually required. The scope is something that should be discussed at WT:VETMED, by whomever wants to work as part of that group. The "work together to improve articles" bit is far more important than the "put your name on a list" bit.
And, again, if there are members of VETMED (Montanabw certainly seems to be one), and those members oppose a merge, then this proposal's dead. "Hostile takeovers" are not permitted. WhatamIdoing (talk) 11:43, 31 August 2016 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Category:Phobias

As seen here and here, and with other recent contributions by Mangoe, Mangoe has removed Category:Phobias from a number of articles, stating, "not a clinical phobia." But I don't see that the category is limited to clinical phobias; there is yet no note about at the top of the category page about how to use this category. Thoughts?

I'll also contact Wikipedia:WikiProject Psychology about weighing in. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 00:02, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

Those I've de-categorized are not phobias at all. Mostly they're social antipathies which are modelled on "homophobia"; a few of them are medical reactions. Mangoe (talk) 05:25, 14 August 2016 (UTC)
The category could do with a note, and link to the main article. How about a List of bullshit "phobias"? Johnbod (talk) 11:47, 14 August 2016 (UTC)
It doesn't really matter if they're "true" phobias. What matters is whether a reader who goes to Cat:Phobias will be interested in this article. This is because categories are for navigation (finding articles) rather than definitions (deciding exactly which thing truly "counts" as a phobia). WhatamIdoing (talk) 12:54, 15 August 2016 (UTC)
Mangoe, what do you think of WhatamIdoing's argument? I'm not overly concerned about this matter, but I would rather that the category not be arbitrarily added or removed. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 00:27, 16 August 2016 (UTC)
No, these social "phobias" aren't really phobias at all; they are prejudices. the origin of them all, homophobia, was coined to imply that prejudice is a result of fear, but that has nothing to do with real phobias. Mangoe (talk) 17:48, 16 August 2016 (UTC)
I agree that a prejudice is different from a phobia and we do the reader a disservice by confounding them. Is there any reason why the social "phobias" are not simply in Category:Prejudices; that would surely be a good starting point for anyone wishing to navigate among them? --RexxS (talk) 21:42, 16 August 2016 (UTC)
OTOH, Chemophobia isn't a social prejudice. I'm not sure how to categorize it, beyond saying that Cat:Chemistry is really not sufficient for interested readers to find this article. It's not entirely unreasonable to compare it to things like arachnophobia, since both are typically irrational and typically improved by factual education. WhatamIdoing (talk) 07:47, 24 August 2016 (UTC)

If others are fine with Mangoe's edits in this regard, I am as well. I noted that this isn't a big issue for me; I am looking for consistency and not arbitrary additions or removals. The category page should be clear about how it is to be used. Once this discussion is archived, I'll note it on the category talk page. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 21:42, 2 September 2016 (UTC)

Top-level domain .pharmacy

This revision to User talk:Jimbo Wales at 19:01, 2 September 2016 (UTC) provided a link to https://consumerist.com/2016/09/01/heres-why-you-shouldnt-order-your-epipens-from-canada/, which mentions the top-level domain (TLD) .pharmacy, for which Wikipedia does not have an article at this moment. DuckDuckGo has search results for site:.pharmacy. Perhaps there are adequate reliable sources (WP:MEDRS) for the article ".pharmacy". If there are not, then editors may wish to add it to their watchlists as an article not yet started, and when it comes into existence it can be categorized in Category:Top-level domains.
—Wavelength (talk) 23:21, 2 September 2016 (UTC)

Websites do not need to follow WP:MEDRS. Websites are not "biomedical information". WhatamIdoing (talk) 07:17, 3 September 2016 (UTC)
Yup agree with WAID Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 10:56, 3 September 2016 (UTC)
I have started the article ".pharmacy". —Wavelength (talk) 19:08, 3 September 2016 (UTC)

Aphantasia

The Aphantasia article begins, "Aphantasia is a hypothesized neurological condition..." There has been some discussion about the word "hypothesized." Some of us believe that there is adequate evidence--the article is supported by references from the BBC, Mind (from 1880), ScienceDirect (which cites still more articles), the New York Times, and New Scientist. Another editor claims that WP:RSMED does not allow us to yet call this established science. I don't see that, but following the guidance on that policy page, am posting here to see what the experts have to say. Matchups 02:13, 3 September 2016 (UTC)

yeah none of those sources you mention are very promising from a MEDRS perspective. hmmm Jytdog (talk) 06:20, 3 September 2016 (UTC)
The concept of a mind's eye has been largely abandoned by recent research — so any disease suggesting its absence can't really be taken very seriously. Stick to the quality sources — this is a hypothetical disease. Carl Fredrik 💌 📧 11:01, 3 September 2016 (UTC)
"Mind's eye" is just another (often informal) way of referring to mental imagery, and mental imagery has been the subject of research for a long time with a credible journal dedicated to it, The Journal of Mental Imagery, founded in 1977, and another credible journal, Imagination, Cognition and Personality, founded in 1981 has an emphasis on mental imagery.
The following sources demonstrate how "mind's eye" is used in the literature:
The term "aphantasia" was proposed in Lives without imagery – Congenital aphantasia (2015) with the following text: "We propose the use of the term ‘ aphantasia’ to refer to a condition of reduced or absent voluntary imagery. Terms used previously in related contexts include ‘defective revisualisation’ (Botez, Olivier, Vezina , Botez, & Kaufman, 1985) and ‘visual irreminiscence’ (Nielsen, 1946)."
That paper uses "mind's eye" elsewhere, but in a manner consistent with the literature as a general colloquial term to refer to visual mental imagery.M. A. Bruhn (talk) 21:38, 3 September 2016 (UTC)

There is already significant discussion on the article's talk page. May I suggest that it be continued there, rather than divided in two. My intention in this post was to notify followers of this project of the existing discussion. Apologies if I was not clear on that. Matchups 03:46, 4 September 2016 (UTC)

Out-of-process categories

It looks like User:Mario Castelán Castro has been manually trying to move around some of the psychoactive drug categories outside the WP:CFD process. It's not my area at all, I came across it whilst doing some non-topic-related category work but could someone take a look at his recent edits? I've no idea whether he's being helpful or not, but looking at his Talk page history it looks like he's not the greatest consensus-builder. TIA (also posted to WP Pharmacology) Le Deluge (talk) 18:23, 2 September 2016 (UTC)

I have reorganized some categories. Diffs for categories do not show the relevant differences. Therefore, you can't easily see the difference that I have made. However, you can see the end result. The content is now more logically organized. No coverage in topics was lost due to these edits. For example, now psychoactive drugs can be browsed by effects and mechanism of action (those are just 2 examples of several categories I have created which have been populated the same day because they were highly needed to organize otherwise scattered categories).
If you are going to write your opinion on an editor's contribution history, please take the care to look properly instead of just taking a quick glance at the first page of "Special:Contribution". Your criticism to be highly biased against me. I have performed several contributions far overshadowing the pre-existing content in those articles in length and importance. The most recent one is when I added 50,000+ characters with tens of sources from scientific journals about the molecular biology of Skin whitening. More recently, I have been working in building consensus in Talk:Diesel engine.
Mario Castelán Castro (talk) 19:11, 2 September 2016 (UTC).
If you want others to look into someone's edits then you should explain why looking into them is warranted with more than a statement that they are not following a voluntary process and a statement critical of the user. A brief glance at their contributions makes it appear that they are not "trying to "delete" categories by removing them from all the articles" but rather that they are creating sub-categories and moving articles into those subcategories. M. A. Bruhn (talk) 19:41, 2 September 2016 (UTC)
In practice, WP:CFD is pretty much expected for any large-scale messing about with categories. WP:BOLD works well for the quieter corners of Wikipedia but where there's a reasonable number of people interested, as in the category hierarchy, then WP:CONSENSUS is expected. There's also the practical issue that going through the CFD process is a lot less effort, as the "prize" for getting consensus is that bots do all the hard work! In my experience, when an individual starts doing lots of manual category changes like that, then 4 times out of 5 they are doing so against consensus. Experience also suggests that people who blank their User Talk page usually do so because they have something to hide about their interactions with other Wikipedians, it didn't inspire confidence when looking at the history one of the most recent deletions was this complaint. So that was why I was a little bit wary - nothing more - and was just asking for someone with more experience to take a look at the edits. I wasn't demanding they got reverted or anything, just asking for a second opinion as experience suggested they could be against consensus.Le Deluge (talk) 23:19, 2 September 2016 (UTC)
To Le Deluge: All of the text you have added here since you created this section amounts to merely:
  • A pretentious complaint based around the premise that I should have followed your preferred way of doing things. I am not going to abide by your opinion and preferences as if they were policy. If my way of editing does not conform to your taste, do not complain to me.
  • A lot of unfounded assumptions about my behavior from which you make incorrect inferences of wrongdoing on my part.
Replying to “In practice, WP:CFD is pretty much expected for any large-scale messing about with categories.”: This a dishonest phrasing. You expect this, but it is not the policy. Therefore, this is yet another case of you pretending that I have to abide by your opinion as if it was policy, which I am not going to do.
It is nosense to suggest that blanking one's talk page is because one has “something to hide”. The history is available. Also, I have practiced blanking my user talk page since I began editing Wikipedia. Your personal comments and insinuations against me are out of place on Wikiproject talk pages. If this continues, this may be interpreted as a breach of WP:AGF and WP:NPA.
Mario Castelán Castro (talk) 23:52, 2 September 2016 (UTC).
Sigh. WP:CFD is not "my opinion and preferences", it is the mechanism by which WP:CONSENSUS is reached in relation to major changes to categories, per the WP:Categorization guideline. If you have a problem with the need for consensus, then maybe Wikipedia is not for you. Again I repeat - I was not trying to get your work deleted, I was just drawing attention to it for a second opinion, a way to gain consensus for your changes after the fact since you hadn't gone through the normal mechanism for reaching consensus. That's all. There's no need to make a big deal of it. Le Deluge (talk) 01:04, 3 September 2016 (UTC)
WP:CFD isn't even an appropriate place for routine WP:SUBCAT work, let alone being required by policy. CFD is for "renaming, merging or deletion of categories", none of which this user has done. A general discussion of how to choose subcategories would be better had at a relevant wikiproject, but it definitely isn't so controversial as to necessitate discussion. Nobody thinks you are trying to get someone's work deleted, but you shouldn't go around posting to multiple message boards stating that someone doesn't look like "the greatest consensus-builder" without even provocation. M. A. Bruhn (talk) 01:50, 3 September 2016 (UTC)
This user has renamed categories that affect a large number of drug articles. The relevant Wiki project to discuss these changes would have been at WT:PHARMA which this user has not done. This user also has a history of making controversial changes without obtaining prior consensus (see for example List of designer drugs). Obtaining consensus before making potentially controversial changes is the preferred way of doing things, especially if it affects a large number of articles which it has in this case. Boghog (talk) 06:41, 3 September 2016 (UTC)
WP:CAT recommends a listing at CFD for "complicated re-categorization of existing categories". (CFD is not recommended when you are re-catting hundreds of articles in a simple way.) I think that reasonable people could disagree about whether this is "complicated". WhatamIdoing (talk) 07:16, 3 September 2016 (UTC)
Strongly agree that CFD should be used, and relevant projects notified (unfortunately not part of the the guidelines). No views (yet) on this case, but with the Cat-a-Lot tool, there are far too many people rearranging large category schemes on an often very ill-informed whim. Johnbod (talk) 02:49, 4 September 2016 (UTC)

Could someone point out the renamed categories? There's nothing in their move log and I haven't seen that in their contributions. It appears to me that they are 1) going to drug categories which have lot of drug articles and subcategories in them, 2) creating new sub-categories, 3) moving the drug articles and categories into those subcategories. They also apparently consulted the village pump about including eponymous articles. If I am wrong in my understanding in their edits, please let me know. But if the above is an accurate description then I don't see how it could be reasonably thought of as complicated. At this point we might as well begin a discussion at WT:PHARMA to look at these edits. M. A. Bruhn (talk) 03:44, 4 September 2016 (UTC)

Note for WP:VET project talk page

A note can be put at the top of the WP:VET project for editors to also comment at WP:MED for important matters. Thoughts? QuackGuru (talk) 07:22, 3 September 2016 (UTC)

seems reasonable--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 10:15, 3 September 2016 (UTC)
This can only be done if VETMED people want to have such a note. A WikiProject talk page should be treated like a user talk page for the group. If you wouldn't put a note at the top of my user talk page to tell people to comment on your user talk page for important matters, then this group should not do the same thing to that group. WhatamIdoing (talk) 07:57, 4 September 2016 (UTC)

Discussion at BLPN

Hello. After a content dispute, I recently took an issue to BLPN. The thread is WP:BLPN#Brian Day, and it is about how to frame the debate about a controversial Canadian physician. I don't really understand the issues involved so well, and I would really like for more clueful editors to both chime into the BLPN discussion and to watchlist the article. Thank you. I'm also going to post this to WikiProject Canada. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 03:45, 4 September 2016 (UTC)



Proposed deletion for Category:Hebephilia and Category:Films about hebephilia

See Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2016 September 6#NEW NOMINATIONS. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 03:51, 6 September 2016 (UTC)



need opinions(gave mine)--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 10:47, 6 September 2016 (UTC)

Michael B. Bracken

have done a few edits on above article, which had images that seemed promotional, as well as, "additional" text.Please watch/give opinion at talk/article, thank you (left note w/ editor/article creator[10])[11]--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 10:39, 6 September 2016 (UTC)

Tagged as COI. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 11:01, 6 September 2016 (UTC)

New format of linking articles

User:Mario Castelán Castro has been adding the following "see also" section to a number of articles [12], [13] "

See also
Antipsychotics
Drug classes defined by psychological effects
Drugs by psychological effects
Psychoactive drugs

" IMO this is already handled by infoboxes and categories. Wondering others thoughts? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 04:46, 5 September 2016 (UTC)


It's a novel feature, but inserting into the See Also section violates MOS:SEEALSO which specifies these sections should only contain a bulleted list of internal wikilinks to other articles. There's no precedent that I can see for it's usage in articles; it's an implementation of the "Category tree" template which appears commonly in Wikiproject, portal, category, and talk spaces but is only used once in article space. If it's to be included in articles then it would definitely be most appropriate to include alongside the navigation templates. Addition of a novel navigation template like this to many pages is likely to be controversial. A discussion should be started at WT:PHARMA (since they are most relevant since these are drug articles) to seek consensus. M. A. Bruhn (talk) 06:15, 5 September 2016 (UTC)
It's just the category tree. It gives you exactly the same list that you would get if you went to the same category. (Compare the contents of Category:Antipsychotics vs what you find under the first item in this list.) If memory serves, categories aren't visible on mobile devices. This might help mobile readers (about half of readers) find the categories. However, it doesn't work the same way on the mobile website. In particular, Outline of stagecraft precedes the collapsed list with the instruction to "Click the "►" below to see all subcategories:". The "►" arrow is not visible on the mobile website and clicking the name of the category takes you to the category page rather than displaying the list. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:58, 5 September 2016 (UTC)
The template itself provides 4 category trees, the first category tree is the drug (in this case Antipsychotics), and then it provides the following 3 category trees ► Drug classes defined by psychological effects ► Drugs by psychological effects ► Psychoactive drugs. The categories not appearing on mobile makes it seem as though the community doesn't want categories to appear on mobile (I wouldn't know why, but then again I always use the desktop version on my phone). I would like it if somehow the category bar itself allowed navigating the category trees. M. A. Bruhn (talk) 07:42, 5 September 2016 (UTC)
Neither desktop nor mobile is fully controlled by volunteers, and volunteers did not make that decision. (This is probably a good thing, because very few of us have the necessary skills.) The mobile has been designed to make it easier, faster, and cheaper to use on smartphones. It omits a number of elements such as navboxes and categories. And even though they've done a lot of work on that, Google has decided it's still too heavy, and stripped it down even further for users in developing countries. Compare these three views:
Most editors at the English Wikipedia really don't know or even care about how the site looks or works on mobile. If we cared, then we'd have gotten rid of several column templates, designed navboxes (which are tables) so that they don't take up multiple screenfuls on small boxes, written better leads, etc. Among non-editing readers, the existence of the mobile site occasionally gets sent word-of-mouth through social networks as "the secret" way to make Wikipedia easier to read, even among users who use desktop machines. (Can you spell presbyopia? Apparently none of the designers for the Monobook skin could.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 11:45, 5 September 2016 (UTC)
  • we already have navboxes for all this. Cats go at the bottom of the page. This is just clutter. Jytdog (talk) 22:38, 5 September 2016 (UTC)
    • and what of WAID's point about mobile (omission of navboxes and cats)? It's not just clutter - but this may not be the forum for solving that problem. — soupvector (talk) 03:47, 6 September 2016 (UTC)
      • soupvector that is a good point. I don't know what the right answer is for mobile. We generally have people linking relevant articles in three ways 1) categories done the normal way 2) navboxes, and 3) just piling up a list of wikilinks to compounds they see as "related" (who knows how) in See also, like this: Clomifene#See_also. And now we have 4) categories done this new way. We do need a better solution that we can apply consistently, and I do see the need to address mobile. Jytdog (talk) 15:19, 6 September 2016 (UTC)
    • Whichever it is, it is beyond the scope to solve it here, so I'm with Jytdog on this one. Toss, but if the editor is unhappy, maybe point them to the Village Pump technical or something, as it's a way bigger issue than this project. Montanabw(talk) 03:52, 6 September 2016 (UTC)
  • WAID, what is the source for the statistic that about half our page views are not mobile? The most recent stats I could find were for 2013 and it was ~15% then. (source). I was going to open a thread an Village Pump Technical to keep this moving and wanted to lead with that, but wanted to source it. Jytdog (talk) 21:20, 6 September 2016 (UTC)
    • Have a look at {{Navbox visibility}}. I left the link there a while ago, so that the numbers could be updated whenever someone wants. However, Analytics has been re-jiggering a bunch of stats reports, so if it's not working any longer, then we'll have to go find the new one. (Also, note that it varies per language, with some languages in developing countries having much higher rates, so be sure that you know whether you're looking at all projects or just the English Wikipedia.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 07:33, 7 September 2016 (UTC)

BioRxiv support in citations

Main page: Help_talk:Citation_Style_1 § BioRxiv_support

This project's feedback would be appreciated in this discussion, as this could greatly (and positively) affect biological citations! Headbomb {talk / contribs / physics / books} 22:16, 7 September 2016 (UTC)

Portal:Medicine

I just discovered this exists. Seems pretty sparsely used.... does anybody care about the portal and if so why? Not proposing to delete it, just curious. Jytdog (talk) 21:10, 6 September 2016 (UTC)

its informative...though I see your point--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 10:53, 7 September 2016 (UTC)
Over 500 pages in the article namespace link to it. —Shelley V. Adams ‹blame
credit› 11:24, 7 September 2016 (UTC)
Oh I see, like at Abortion, at the very bottom, there is a link to the Medicine portal as well as Portal:Human rights. hm. Jytdog (talk) 17:59, 7 September 2016 (UTC)
Got less than 5,000 views in the last month.[14] Meh Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:18, 7 September 2016 (UTC)
Basically, it (as well as all other portals) are only linked by templates ([15]). I've several times raised the idea of getting rid of portals, seeing as they are neither used nor maintained, but they're so entrenched with parts of the community that I don't see that happening.
The least we could do is remove the pointless links from the bottom of our nav-templates. Carl Fredrik 💌 📧 22:38, 7 September 2016 (UTC)
I removed the "news" section. There's very little medicine-related news. There have been only five stories posted during the last 12 months, and they aren't even necessarily what we'd consider medical news: a hospital bombing, a white person had Ebola, an apology for saying something rude about a disabled public figure, a murder–suicide, and a cloudy-looking swimming pool at the Olympics site. Because there are so few articles, each news item stays on the portal for an average of 10 months. It doesn't seem likely to be a good fit. WhatamIdoing (talk) 10:22, 8 September 2016 (UTC)
Thanks for the improvements. I am sort of neutral about their existence. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 12:25, 8 September 2016 (UTC)
The medicine portal needs an update to end all updates. In other words, design it in such a way that it doesn't need regular updating. It can then fossilise in the usual fashion. JFW | T@lk 12:41, 8 September 2016 (UTC)
I'm not entirely sure we can equate views with usage in this case. Links to the portal are littered all over the place — but the portal itself is essentially useless. Carl Fredrik 💌 📧 11:23, 9 September 2016 (UTC)

Drug-resistant epilipsy

Drug-resistant epilepsy was created by a new user yesterday. There's a lot of information referenced to primary literature – maybe someone from this project could review it for WP:MEDRS compliance? Joe Roe (talk) 13:20, 9 September 2016 (UTC)

Thanks! I speedy tagged per dupe. Jytdog (talk) 17:21, 9 September 2016 (UTC)
Is a subpage. Done a bit but more needed. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 02:11, 10 September 2016 (UTC)
gah it totally duplicates what is in Epilepsy - every option there after the drug step in management is for this... Jytdog (talk) 03:02, 10 September 2016 (UTC)

And we have Epilepsy surgery. Merging of these last two is required at least. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 13:21, 10 September 2016 (UTC)

Concerning article about cosmetic procedure

Came across this:

"The normal color of the gum tissue (gingiva) is pink, but excess deposits of melanin (melanin gingival hyperpigmentation) can create what seem to be black spots or patches on the gums, creating an aesthetic or cosmetic problem."

Actually, melanin pigmentation in the gums is entirely normal, the degree of which is strongly influenced by race. There is no periodontal pathology depicted in the individual in the photo.

Currently I feel this article is misleading people into thinking there is something wrong with their bodies and encourages them to seek this cosmetic procedure. The procedure is also not discussed in terms of potential complications. Matthew Ferguson (talk) 04:40, 11 September 2016 (UTC)

Ah yes COI editors promoting the procedures / businesses. The good Dr. Seuss wrote about the technique in his 1953 book on Sneetches The_Sneetches_and_Other_Stories#.22The_Sneetches.22. Cleaned up some. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:25, 11 September 2016 (UTC)

Ageing

There's currently a dispute on the interpretation of a reference at Talk:Ageing#Message for Plomkg22345: cognitive decline that could benefit from additional input by people familiar with MEDRS and reporting on the scientific consensus. Huon (talk) 15:15, 11 September 2016 (UTC)


  • give opinion(gave mine)note talk page/tagged The Arbitration Committee has permitted Wikipedia administrators to impose discretionary sanctions on any editor editing this page or associated pages--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 17:47, 11 September 2016 (UTC)
Good lord what a mess that article is. Jytdog (talk) 18:02, 11 September 2016 (UTC)
yep--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 18:04, 11 September 2016 (UTC)

British Journal of Anaesthesia

Oropharyngeal Airways

Two (free) special issues of potential interest to project members: Airway Management and Vascular Anaesthesia. Nikkimaria (talk) 21:42, 11 September 2016 (UTC)


Denervation atrophy of Type II muscle fibres

I added a photo of "Denervation atrophy of Type II muscle fibres" to the Charcot–Marie–Tooth disease article but since I know next to nothing about this, can someone tell me whether that photo is relevant? Kendall-K1 (talk) 23:31, 11 September 2016 (UTC)

its relevant[17]--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 02:21, 13 September 2016 (UTC)
Thanks! Didn't know if maybe there are different kinds of denervation atrophy or what. Kendall-K1 (talk) 03:30, 13 September 2016 (UTC)

Pulsed electromagnetic field therapy

More eyes please - newbie editor edit warring in badly sourced promotional content and won't or hasn't figure out how to discuss things. He is at 4RR now. Jytdog (talk) 20:20, 2 September 2016 (UTC)

I've been blunt at User talk:DrConcern. If he reverts again, he'll have to go to WP:AN3, I'm afraid. --RexxS (talk) 21:50, 2 September 2016 (UTC)
Was also copyright infringement. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 10:55, 3 September 2016 (UTC)


Proposed name change: Intersex surgery to Intersex and medicine

Hi people, I have just made a suggested name change, from Intersex surgery to Intersex and medicine, per its eponymous Category:Intersex and medicine, to assist in a WP:SPLIT of some content from Intersex. More information: Talk:Intersex surgery#Proposed name change. Thanks. Trankuility (talk) 23:45, 4 September 2016 (UTC)


Mitragyna speciosa aka kratom

This is an herbal extract from a tree in thailand that has rising popularity - it is kind of like khat or coca but with stimulus at low doses and opioid effects at higher doses. People use it to self-treat chronic pain or try to get off addication to opioids and recreationally - big online marketplace. The US DEA is considering scheduling it. There is a bunch of online activism about it and folks are showing up to add poorly sourced content, edit warring, not talking, etc. Probably our article is being discussed on a board somewhere.... More eyes/voices would be helpful. Jytdog (talk) 21:23, 13 September 2016 (UTC)

will keep eye on--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 10:31, 14 September 2016 (UTC)

New Cochrane project, and also documenting Cochrane projects

Cochrane (organisation) is a health organization. Their publications are popular here on Wikipedia.

Cochrane has collaborated with the Wikipedia community on various projects since about 2013. I am trying to document what has happened to make it easier to do more together. At meta:Cochrane Collaboration-Wikipedia Initiative there is some documentation of what Cochrane and Wikipedia have done together. I was wanting more of a list, and also Cochrane does most of its activities on English Wikipedia, so I started a new project page at WP:Cochrane. I thought that I could share this as a model of how WikiProject Medicine might document organizational partnerships. I think that everything that Cochrane has done has been discussed among participants in meta:Wiki Project Med, which is an organization including people who have off-wiki discussions with organizations like Cochrane about Wikipedia's medical content.

I started organizing this because Cochrane is starting a pilot program to train health students and experts to contribute health content to Wikipedia. On Wikipedia, I documented this program as an instance of the Wikipedia:Visiting Scholars program. The project page is at

As this is a program targeting people who do not already edit Wikipedia, this is not to target WikiProject Medicine participants directly. However, if anyone knows anyone who might be interested in applying, or if anyone here wishes to support the participants after they are chosen, then feel free. Thanks. Blue Rasberry (talk) 22:11, 13 September 2016 (UTC)

Blue Rasberry, great info [19], thanks--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 15:53, 14 September 2016 (UTC)

Input on Full Evaluation of WP:Research Help Pilot

The Wikipedia Library has now posted a report on its spring pilot test of a Research Help portal. As the report outlines, our target audience of readers and new editors generally reacted more positively to the pilot than experienced editors, who raised important critiques for discussion. The report provides more details on the results and some proposed next steps for the project. Your input is welcome on the report talk page. Astinson (WMF) (talk) 14:35, 14 September 2016 (UTC)


Splitting List of US health information exchanges from main article

I've proposed splitting Health information exchange § List of United States health information exchanges into a stand-alone list. Comments, especially from anyone interested in medical informatics or healthcare IT, would be much appreciated. I'm also seeking input from WP:HEALTH and, as the new article would be country-specific, WP:USA. —Shelley V. Adams ‹blame
credit› 14:11, 15 September 2016 (UTC)


give opinion(gave mine)--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 18:25, 15 September 2016 (UTC)

European Urological Assocation

It appears a EUA-associated account was adding some external links that I found valuable and was then quickly blocked—see User talk:EAU Patient Information. (I am operating on the assumption that the EUA is a respectable medical society.) I happen to think we should be more welcoming (despite the WP:ADV problem). Thoughts? Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 15:49, 15 September 2016 (UTC)

The main problem I see is that, even if the links were helpful, their username still implies shared use. Their links do seem to be useful, though they seem to definitely be added with the intention of promoting themselves. Also, wouldn't it be better to have this discussion on EAU Patient Information's talk page so they can participate in the discussion and defend their actions? -- Gestrid (talk) 17:41, 15 September 2016 (UTC)
Would be good for them to release their pages under a WP compatible license :-) Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 21:11, 15 September 2016 (UTC)

Draft:Celebrity doctor

started working on this - if anybody wants to work on it, too, fine by me Jytdog (talk) 20:20, 14 September 2016 (UTC)

looks like an informative article, should be moved to mainspace(its fine as is)--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 11:40, 15 September 2016 (UTC)
Speaking of which, it might be good to keep an eye on Robert Sears (physician)#Accusation of medical negligence, since that's in the news this week. WhatamIdoing (talk) 12:30, 15 September 2016 (UTC)
  • Thoughtful 4 minute segment on NPR's All Things Considered today where the host talks with "W. Douglas Evans, director of the Public Health Communication and Marketing Program at the Milken Institute School of Public Health at George Washington University, about the role that celebrity doctors play", the hook of course being Oz' "examination" of Trump today: here. I moved this article to mainspace. Jytdog (talk) 22:29, 15 September 2016 (UTC)

Re-joining WP:MED

So, the new list of project members using WikiProjectCards is very cool. However, it might be a good idea to do talk page notifications about re-joining the project for users who signed up in the past and/or those with the WP:MED userbox on their user page. I realize many of those users are inactive, but how many of us regularly check the (non-talk) pages of the projects we've already joined? I only noticed it because I went to grab the project page URL to include in an email. —Shelley V. Adams ‹blame
credit› 05:38, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

yes that would be helpful(the current list is missing quite a few editors)--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 10:47, 1 September 2016 (UTC)
I just did and doesn't show right away; weird lag. Too bad people have to rejoin and this couldn't be automated somehow; nobody needs makework. Jytdog (talk) 22:23, 1 September 2016 (UTC)
What is WikiProjectCards? I just looked at our project page, but I don't see anything about it. Axl ¤ [Talk] 12:37, 5 September 2016 (UTC)
Wikipedia:WikiProject_Medicine/Members its here, --Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 12:43, 5 September 2016 (UTC)
Doc James is a member since 11 June 2016? Hmm.... Axl ¤ [Talk] 12:56, 5 September 2016 (UTC)
Documentation seems to be really sparse. Join date can be changed by editing the page; WikiBlame might be helpful for finding that in the earlier list of participants. —Shelley V. Adams ‹blame
credit› 21:41, 5 September 2016 (UTC)
You can also look up the date of your first edit to this talk page, and use that instead. Those dates can be found in the revision history stats. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:10, 16 September 2016 (UTC)

Paracetamol toxicity

Paracetamol

Could use an update and ref scrub if someone's up for it. PMID 27350943 PMC 4913076 is an excellent new ref.LeadSongDog come howl! 16:32, 16 September 2016 (UTC)

Fluoride "neurotoxicity" report

See discussion here: Talk:Philip_J._Landrigan#2014_Report and many old discussions at Fluoride like this - there are several others. Jytdog (talk) 03:18, 17 September 2016 (UTC)


TESPAL - hand-drawn images

Any views on the hand-drawn images recently added to TESPAL? This article seems to be the subject of an educational assignment (see Wikipedia:Education program/B K Shah Medical Institute), so it might be interesting to check the quality of the other articles involved.

I've raised the general question of hand-drawn unverifiable images at Wikipedia_talk:Image_use_policy#Hand-drawn_images, as this is the second instance I've noticed this week, having never spotted any before. I can't find any policy or guidelines, but it seems inappropriate that an editor can create an image and upload it with no sources etc, let alone the quality issues of drawings on lined notepad pages! PamD 11:01, 30 August 2016 (UTC)

See also Uncinectomy, from another student on the same course. PamD 11:26, 30 August 2016 (UTC)
Images are fine. Okay to use until we have something better. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 12:40, 30 August 2016 (UTC)
SVG[22] sounds good...IMO--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 15:22, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

Reliable medical source?

Is http://www.drtbalu.com/index.html a reliable source? It's cited in a broken way in TESPAL but I've now found it through a link from Frontal Sinus Trephination, another article being worked on by the educational assignment mentioned above. PamD 11:11, 30 August 2016 (UTC)

no, should follow Wikipedia:Identifying_reliable_sources_(medicine)--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 12:26, 30 August 2016 (UTC)
No not a suitable source. Left a note with the editor in question. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 12:31, 30 August 2016 (UTC)

Class

Fungal sinusitis

Class page is here [23]. Please clean up as needed. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 12:35, 30 August 2016 (UTC)

I moved the most of them - not all - to draft space. There are significant COPYVIO concerns in a bunch of these too. Jytdog (talk) 02:02, 18 September 2016 (UTC)

BodyPump

BodyPump: seems rather promotional in tone; makes medical claims, most of which appear reasonably well sourced to primary studies in the literature, but not to any secondary sources. Would appreciate input from others. Thanks. Bondegezou (talk) 15:08, 16 September 2016 (UTC)

thanks, nominated for speedy deletion Jytdog (talk) 15:44, 16 September 2016 (UTC)
Thanks all for input. Bondegezou (talk) 08:49, 19 September 2016 (UTC)

Non free images marked as free

We have the predatory site OMICS International supposedly offering images under a CC BY 4.0 license. But some of them are watermarked.[25] I assume all their stuff is simply plagarized. Unfortunately Google is not smart enough to know the difference. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 01:10, 13 September 2016 (UTC)

I think that as a working assumption anything sourced to OMICS should be removed. That company is an ethics-free zone and we should have nothing to do with them on principle. In this specific case, we have credible claims that they have published fraudulent work, and plausible evidence of claiming rights over things that are not their intellectual property. The value of any image from an OMICS journal is, IMO, lower than the potential risks. Guy (Help!) 23:55, 13 September 2016 (UTC)
I only found one article that might have an inappropriate source to this group (Magnetic refrigeration), and I have tagged that source with {{unreliable source}}. There are multiple pages in the File: namespace that link to it (e.g., as the source of a logo for a school). WhatamIdoing (talk) 12:22, 15 September 2016 (UTC)
Concur with Guy. However, Google image search was able to find similar images based on the url for the suspect jpg. Choosing "all sizes" came up with several (with various cropping), including the dermnet image they hijacked.LeadSongDog come howl! 18:55, 20 September 2016 (UTC)

Topic of sperm in pre-ejaculate

At Talk:Pre-ejaculate#Risks: Sperm in pre-ejaculate, sourcing issues are addressed. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 12:33, 21 September 2016 (UTC)


Some recent health content at the Sexual abuse article

Opinions are needed on the following Talk:Sexual abuse#Latest additions. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 15:01, 21 September 2016 (UTC)


give opinion(gave mine)--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 20:41, 21 September 2016 (UTC)

Weather pains

Should this article have an infobox? More particularly, should it have an ICD-9-CM code? There's related discussion at an RFD that might benefit from someone medical looking in on it, though I'm more concerned about weather pains. Thanks. — Gorthian (talk) 00:16, 17 September 2016 (UTC)

That ICD-9 code should not be in that infobox - it's a completely nonspecific code. My sense, absent such a code, is that there's no need for the infobox. — soupvector (talk) 22:15, 21 September 2016 (UTC)


give opinion(gave mine[26])--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 12:22, 17 September 2016 (UTC)

Opinions needed about the Coregasm article

Hi, all. Please have a look at the Coregasm article, and weigh in at Talk:Coregasm#Floated. Is the article fine as it is? Does it need any changes? Should it exist? Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 07:08, 10 September 2016 (UTC)

Silly fluff dressed up as a serious topic. So, under a heading "The experience" we get:

Unlike an orgasm resulting from vaginal intercourse, a coregasm might feel "more dull, less intense, and more tingly", although it lasts about the same amount of time as a conventional orgasm.

(presumably these experiences are for women only?). I'd nominate it for deletion except it'd be a waste of time because Wikipedia embraces this kind of guff. Alexbrn (talk) 10:41, 10 September 2016 (UTC)
Merge to orgasm. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 13:11, 10 September 2016 (UTC)
More voices would be helpful here. Thanks. Jytdog (talk) 21:20, 13 September 2016 (UTC)
probably should be merged to orgasm...IMO--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 12:33, 22 September 2016 (UTC)

Thread carpal tunnel release

Thread Carpal Tunnel Release

Thread carpal tunnel release (TCTR; Guo technique) could use some outside sourcing. The author only edits carpal tunnel articles an uses a user name of Joseph9400 (talk · contribs); all the sources for this article includes an author named Joseph Guo, so there may be some personal sourcing? -- 65.94.171.217 (talk) 07:17, 21 September 2016 (UTC)

did a few edits needs a lot more though(Guo [27])--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 12:42, 22 September 2016 (UTC)

Serious problems with Tenoten article

This is a homeopathic preparation of dubious notability, and the article relies on primary sources (very small-scale human studies, or animal studies). "Tenoten is described as acting as an antibody of the brain-specific protein S-100B. Other antibodies of S-100 that are approved for clinical use in Russia include Proproten (or Proproten-100) (Russian: Пропротен-100), Brizantin (Russian: Бризантин) and Divaza (Russian: Диваза). They all similarly have been reported to possess anxiolytic and antidepressant properties." - This is nonsense. What do you think - prune heavily to remove poorly-sourced and scientifically implausible claims, or delete due to general lack of notability? WildCation (talk) 14:30, 15 September 2016 (UTC)

[28]Pubmed doesn't seem to offer reviews(I'm inclined to your latter suggestion)--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 15:41, 15 September 2016 (UTC)
  • Half the article was talking about reality-based products, so I removed that. All the supportive sources are in the same journal, Bulletin of Experimental Biology and Medicine. This is a Springer journal, why are they publishing this crap? Or did the authors fail to disclose that the product had no active ingredient? Guy (Help!) 16:02, 15 September 2016 (UTC)
    • The journal is a translation of two Russian journals, neither of which is run by Springer, so they aren't at all involved in the peer review. Thank you for removing the bits about actual reality-based products - antibodies for this target might plausibly have some biological effect, but comparing them to a homeopathic preparation that supposedly acts as an antibody despite being a sugar pill... WildCation (talk) 16:12, 15 September 2016 (UTC)
Ref: Delger AB, Avakyan GN, Oleinikova OM, Bogomazova MA, Chromych EA, Lagutin IuV (2012). "Effects of tenoten on anxiety and depression disorders in patients with epilepsy". Bull. Exp. Biol. Med. 153 (5): 704–6. doi:10.1007/s10517-012-1804-7. PMID 23113263.</ref><ref name="pmid20027370">Duma SA, Shishkin SV (2009). "Tenoten in the therapy of patients with moderate cognitive impairment". Bull. Exp. Biol. Med. 148 (2): 353–6. doi:10.1007/s10517-009-0679-8. PMID 20027370. - n=56, unblinded.
Yeah, I did some cleanup on that article a while back, but was never really satisfied with it. If there's ever anything substantive published about the product, it would likely be in Russian or Ukrainian. This is a specific case of a general question: How much discussion of an individual homeopathic remedy should be accorded, given that they are all clinically indistinguishable from placebo? Perhaps a standard template should be used for all homeopathic remedies, with a soft redirect to Homeopathy or to Homeopathic Materia Medica. Views?LeadSongDog come howl! 16:25, 16 September 2016 (UTC)
I think we need to stop thinking in terms of physical efficacy, and start thinking of them like cosmetics.[29] Do you feel better if you use them? Do the more expensive ones make you feel better about yourself than the cheap ones? Then they "worked" (no better than placebo).
That means, in other words, that they're notable if sources write about them (i.e., what the WP:GNG says), regardless of whether they are scientifically proven to make people feel better through the particular method that proponents claim. WhatamIdoing (talk) 14:37, 17 September 2016 (UTC)
Not a single review / secondary source. Reverted to the generic homeopathic as we should with such stuff. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 02:31, 21 September 2016 (UTC)
My inclination is that something like Bach flower remedies should have a separate article, but we do not need an article for every single homeopathic remedy from every single manufacturer. WildCation (talk) 10:10, 23 September 2016 (UTC)

Childhood cataract

Added a citation to the first sentence Pchow29 (talk) 04:01, 23 September 2016 (UTC)

Thanks, Pchow29! That's hugely helpful, and I just love that you're using recent review articles for sources.
I expanded the citation to include a few details. The citoid service (the "automatic" citation mode) does magic if you feed it the PubMed URL (like http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25609909 ) but it has more trouble decoding PDFs.  ;-) And whenever you add a good ref like that (even just one) to something that says there are no refs at all, then you should feel free to delete that tag yourself.
What kind of articles or editing work interests you? I might be able to give you a list of things to look over, if you're interested.... WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:17, 23 September 2016 (UTC)

Telegony revived

Please comment at Talk:Telegony (pregnancy)#You guys should check this source. Tgeorgescu (talk) 23:37, 23 September 2016 (UTC)

Total readership of WPMED

We have updated monthly pageviews that includes mobile for Aug 2016. It is 190,445,556.[32] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:59, 21 September 2016 (UTC)

very informative--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 20:09, 21 September 2016 (UTC)
Thanks for letting us know about the update. Seems very thorough.Charlotte135 (talk) 02:09, 22 September 2016 (UTC)
Why is the number of pages going down? Is there an effort to pare down the number of pages marked in the scope of WP:MED? Sizeofint (talk) 02:11, 22 September 2016 (UTC)
Last number we have on pages was over 30K which is the highest number ever. A number of us removed anatomy and many sex related topics from WPMED a number of years back which may account for the prior drop. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 02:53, 22 September 2016 (UTC)
Nm, I was reading the table backwards. Thanks. Sizeofint (talk) 03:17, 22 September 2016 (UTC)
What's our desktop:mobile ratio? WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:23, 23 September 2016 (UTC)
Data is at the bottom of this.[33] It is over half mobile and has been for some time. (55/45) Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 18:31, 24 September 2016 (UTC)
One thing that I can share is this Massviews Analysis tool. The tool does several things, but for example, if anyone gives it a single Wikipedia page with a list of Wikipedia article links in it, then it will report the total pageviews of all articles in the list for any range of dates. So for example, a person can make a list of articles on their userpage, then get a report of how many times those articles have been viewed. James is counting ~20,000 articles, but also, we could be setting up specialized lists that could motivate particular health sectors to develop articles. This tool just became available in its current form the past 1-2 weeks. Blue Rasberry (talk) 15:59, 23 September 2016 (UTC)
That tool only works for up to 500 pages I think. They are working on a better tool. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 18:31, 24 September 2016 (UTC)

International Journal of Audiology

Meet the editor of this journal last week. They are interested in the idea of publishing Wikipedia articles following formal peer review in the area of audiology. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 18:36, 24 September 2016 (UTC)

great opportunity--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 20:39, 24 September 2016 (UTC)

Nicotine dependence

A new article was created with mass original research and off-topic information not explicitly about nicotine dependence. I think it should be moved to a draft or redirected to Nicotine#Reinforcement disorders. There may not be enough content for a separate page once all the OR and off-topic content is removed. The main section at Nicotine#Reinforcement disorders was not expanded to warrant a new article. The first source I checked to verify the claim failed verification. Please do not move any content to another page unless you are able to verify the claim using a reliable source. QuackGuru (talk) 15:46, 3 September 2016 (UTC)

I think the subject justifies its own page, though clearly this needs further work. If it wasn't you, I'd suggest engaging with the newish author about the problems. Johnbod (talk) 02:45, 4 September 2016 (UTC)

See Nicotine dependence#Assessment and Diagnosis. "These measures provide insight into what might be termed “psychological” dependence..." The quote brackets around psychological appears to be a cut and paste, but there is no source at the end of the sentence. It appears other text was cut and pasted. See WP:COPYVIO. QuackGuru (talk) 03:40, 4 September 2016 (UTC)

Those are scare quotes, which do not imply copyright violations (which can't be done on a single word anyway). The presence of curly quotes could mean that the sentence (or just the word) was copied from another source, but it could also mean that the editor typed the contents in a word processing program first. WhatamIdoing (talk) 08:00, 4 September 2016 (UTC)
"Reinforcement disorder" isn't a thing, so that should be changed. It sounds like it might need some work, but there's definitely enough literature for a separate main article on nicotine dependence. I'm surprised we didn't have one already. —PermStrump(talk) 19:24, 4 September 2016 (UTC)
Are you sure about that? The phrase is used at the top of the {{Addiction}} navbox. Perhaps User:Seppi333 would share an opinion about that. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:08, 5 September 2016 (UTC)
A reinforcement disorder is an addiction, a dependence, or both. A substance use disorder, as defined by the DSM, refers to both disorders simultaneously. Seppi333 (Insert 2¢) 06:37, 5 September 2016 (UTC)

The second source I checked to verify the claim also failed verification. The text "These withdrawal symptoms are so unpleasant that smokers very frequently return to smoking.[3]" is not supported by reference 3. Reference 3 is "Alcohol dependence: provisional description of a clinical syndrome" from 1976.[34] It does not mention nicotine dependence or smokers. It is about alcohol dependence. The reference in the article does not include a link to the source and it does not include the date from 1976. QuackGuru (talk) 16:59, 7 September 2016 (UTC)

The article says "With repeated exposure to nicotine, the number of binding sites on nicotinic receptors in the brain increases." The source says "With repeated exposure to nicotine,..." "...the number of binding sites on the nicotinic cholinergic receptors in the brain increases,.."[35] No ref was given at the end of the sentence in the Wikipedia. This suggests there could be other sentences in the article that do not have a source at the end of the sentence that could also be potential copyright violations. QuackGuru (talk) 18:06, 15 September 2016 (UTC)

Article needing review: Surfer's myelopathy

The Surfer's myelopathy seems to me to be in need of review; while it quotes a couple of papers, from a quick check of the open access papers, and a read of the abstract of the closed access one, I'm not sure they actually support much of its content. Which is a bit of a pity, for such a short article. Could someone knowledgeable please review this article? -- The Anome (talk)

will look--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 20:23, 25 September 2016 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:WikiProject LGBT studies/Noticeboard#Arbitration request: Deletion of sourced content motivated by personality disagreements

Please see the above linked discussion and consider weighing in. It is about disputes regarding biomedical information at two different articles, and other issues. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 12:18, 25 September 2016 (UTC)

This is the main edit in question at the moment. Arguments are made at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject LGBT studies/Noticeboard#Arbitration request: Deletion of sourced content motivated by personality disagreements regarding the deletion of the content. Opinions from WP:Med editors are especially needed for the sexual problems and health risks content. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 22:57, 25 September 2016 (UTC)

A review of our work at UCSF

"Why Medical Schools Should Embrace Wikipedia"

After a number of years of effort our article is finally published.[37] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 22:09, 14 September 2016 (UTC)

User:Doc James dead link. i want to see !!!! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jytdog (talk • contribs) 00:13, 15 September 2016 (UTC)
Same problem for me as well, the link does not work. James, when you say our work do you mean the whole medicine project or a specific article? TylerDurden8823 (talk) 06:47, 15 September 2016 (UTC)
@Jytdog and TylerDurden8823:
Could either of you along with anyone else please comment on or change this summary which I am sending to The Signpost? Thanks.
Blue Rasberry (talk) 17:11, 15 September 2016 (UTC)
Your summary looks accurate to me. Briefly mentioning the coordinators and their affiliations is a nice touch. (Disclaimer, I work at UCSF). --Mark viking (talk) 19:12, 20 September 2016 (UTC)
Specifically, getting "403 Forbidden" for that URL. Maybe file on Google Drive is not shared? —Shelley V. Adams ‹blame
credit› 19:05, 15 September 2016 (UTC)
@ShelleyAdams:
Blue Rasberry (talk) 20:33, 15 September 2016 (UTC)
Thanks Blue Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 21:18, 15 September 2016 (UTC)
Great work--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 17:31, 26 September 2016 (UTC)
Very interesting reading, and more than a bit encouraging on the quality front. One wonders, though, what the level of ongoing engagement is: how many of the students kept editing after their course? LeadSongDog come howl! 19:07, 20 September 2016 (UTC)
Just out -
LeadSongDog In ~1000 classes reviewed by the WMF and Wiki Education Foundation, retention rate in the short term was negligible and too small to measure. If there is a retention rate to be studied, then possibly people could return many years after their first edits, but Wikipedia has not been around long enough to test that.
Currently, all education programs focus on soliciting good editing contributions in a short time from editors who will not be on Wikipedia for more than a few weeks. I do not know they numbers, but something like 40 edits over 6 weeks on 1-3 articles per person is common, with an average of 2 comments in on-wiki discussions. If you want to see class outcomes in this model case then visit Wikipedia:UCSF School of Medicine or ask me and I could tell you anything. Blue Rasberry (talk) 19:16, 20 September 2016 (UTC)
That was my impression too, but it seems like a terrible waste. Even a tiny amount of continued engagement could help. How about something like a once-per-year email? Something like: "Hi there, thank you for your contributions to Wikipedia Project Medicine. We've missed you, please drop by from time to time to see what's new." If even a few re-engaged later in their careers, it would be a big win for the project.LeadSongDog come howl! 20:54, 20 September 2016 (UTC)
We're already doing better than average: Most people who create accounts don't make even one edit; most people who make their first edit don't ever edit again – with that account, which is another problem for these stats. Someone might want to create an account that isn't associated with student editing, especially when that class account can be traced back to the owners' real-world names. And many people just edit while logged out, even when they have accounts and remember the passwords. WhatamIdoing (talk) 14:59, 21 September 2016 (UTC)
LeadSongDog Your idea is completely reasonable. I know that if asked, you could probably list other reasonable interventions to test. It is difficult for me or anyone else to say what should be done, but I can talk about some of what is being done. The matter is currently being decided by finance. While the Wikipedia community could be organizing experiments like the one you described, in practice, it does not happen. The common term for what you describe is "necromancy", or summoning dead users. See meta:Research:Necromancy for a WMF 2012 study on this, but the issue is raised often. Right now, data suggests that the cost of recruiting new users is lower than the cost of funding necromancy programs, and that new user programs give better results. Problems with this approach include poor data, rapidly and continually changing software and policy circumstances, and social pressures like irrationality due to risk of community backlash. A lot of Wikipedia editors want the education program to include retention programs but the situation has become complicated and without significant input of resources - either money, community support, software changes, or some other form of stability - I do not see a near future in which anyone in Wikipedia education addresses retention in any way. A massive amount of data is being produced and it is challenging to make sense of what is happening. If you find someone with time and interest then I could give them a tour of some contemporary challenges by Skype or Hangouts.
I agree with what WIAD - education programs already are producing some good outcomes, and they are introducing some unusual challenges which do not appear elsewhere. Blue Rasberry (talk) 15:11, 21 September 2016 (UTC)
Maybe I'm missing something, but it appears that meta:Research:Necromancy is so caught up in the minutia (of how often, with what wording, by what tool, etc.) that it loses out on the basic goal: just contact the absent users, at least once, to engage an ongoing interest after the course. This needn't be a costly thing, a database dump can feed an email list for next to no effort. It should be a matter of just a few minutes work for someone with the correct tools and access rights. Let us not allow the quest for perfection to delay real progress. LeadSongDog come howl! 16:16, 21 September 2016 (UTC)
LeadSongDog Yes, there is missing information, but instead of saying that you are missing something it might be more accurate to say that the information necessary to understand the situation is absent. I am not aware of any Wikimedia community group which has become organized enough to try the intervention you propose, so that raises the question of why that is. I confirm that the idea is good, and it seems like it would be easy to do this, but in practice - it is not being managed.
At meta:2015 Community Wishlist Survey there is a collection of wishes from last year, and surprisingly to me, the WMF has fulfilled almost all of them. In November there will be a call for more wishes with 10 being selected. Perhaps you would be interested in supporting or proposing some wishes.
One wish might be better management of mailing lists. Right now, there is no way to easily manage group mailing lists associated with Wikipedia user accounts. There is meta:MassMessage for sending notices on wiki, but no wiki-system for sending out emails, and no integration to choose to get either on-wiki or email notices except if someone receives an on-wiki notice and has opted into to email notices for every on-wiki notice. Overall, the communication process could be reformed. One reform could be a way for someone to do mass-message by email.
If there were reason to believe that a group of individuals were interested in medicine (or any topic), and they had shared their email address and agreed to get notices by email if messaged, and there was an easy way to send emails to a group, then someone could do experiments like "just contact the absent users, at least once, to engage an ongoing interest after the course". Right now, there is a cultural barrier against this and the technical barrier of requiring this to happen one user at a time is a reflection of the cultural barrier.
I am not sure if the problem is mostly technical, mostly cultural, or because of lack of organizational management, but I can confirm that when people seem very interested but then drop off I am not aware of any attempt by any group to invite people back in a systematic way. Blue Rasberry (talk) 21:28, 22 September 2016 (UTC)
It's technically possible to send e-mail messages, because the m:Research:Increasing article coverage project sent e-mail messages to a bunch of editors. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:15, 23 September 2016 (UTC)

Outline of diabetes

Is this really something we do? Jytdog (talk) 15:41, 16 September 2016 (UTC)

Just one of many pointless outline articles, I recently did some work getting rid of links to Outline of anatomy. They're generally very difficult to get deleted (on account a lobby of users created hundreds of them a few years back) — so the solution is to make sure they have no incoming links and keep them a walled garden. Same as how to solve the issue with portals. Carl Fredrik 💌 📧 16:27, 16 September 2016 (UTC)
Oh my there is even a WP:WikiProject Outlines. Jytdog (talk) 16:43, 16 September 2016 (UTC)
WP has had outlines for years. Like list-based articles, navboxes, and portals, , some editors like them and some hate them. Their quality spans the range from excellent presentations of the the basic topics in a field to unreferenced first draft attempts. I have a personal fondness for well-done outlines, but understand other's criticisms, too. This particular outline could use better referencing to justify the hierarchy and inclusion criteria. --Mark viking (talk) 17:58, 16 September 2016 (UTC)
Maybe they can be linked from the navboxes? Not a big fan of see also sections being created to put them in. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 18:12, 16 September 2016 (UTC)
It is hard enough to keep regular articles up to date and free of garbage. The idea of maintaining a whole parallel set of "outlines" is horrifying, and the idea that WP should provide "cliff notes" is way, way off mission. Outlines =/= accepted knowledge, but some kind of learning tool. Move them to Wikiversity, nuke them, or wall them off. What a misguided mess. Jytdog (talk) 18:17, 16 September 2016 (UTC)
Yes the idea of moving them to Wikiversity is a good one. These are sort of massive "see also" lists / navboxes that work on mobile which navboxes do not. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 18:30, 16 September 2016 (UTC)
I think moving them to Wikiversity may be a good idea as well. Would Wikiversity accept them? I assume they have different policies and content standards. Sizeofint (talk) 21:48, 16 September 2016 (UTC)
I doubt it. Wikiversity mostly seems to do teaching aids (e.g., worksheets for students) these days.
Jytdog's criticism ("not accepted knowledge") applies equally to navboxes. Essentially, they're one big navbox (only visible on mobile, and not colored blue). WhatamIdoing (talk) 14:53, 17 September 2016 (UTC)
Hmm, I see. Probably not viable then. Sizeofint (talk) 15:09, 17 September 2016 (UTC)

Mark viking — I won't dispute that they are potentially useful, but they are unmanageable. In certain fields they have been worked out to cover enough of the topic to be actually useful, but in medicine or anatomy (which each encompass 20.000+ articles) they just end up being an added layer of things that need to be kept up to date. To respond to the other idea voiced here — I don't think they serve any true purpose on Wikiversity. Their main use is for editors, and if I were to suggest anything it would be to move them to project-space, where fewer readers will mistakenly come across them. Carl Fredrik 💌 📧 10:54, 17 September 2016 (UTC)

I can see your point of view, especially in the context of WP:MED. In this case, the parent article diabetes is already a solid, fairly comprehensive article on the topic, so it is not clear that the outline adds much value for the reader. Also WP:MED folk, more so than other projects, feel a responsibility to keep medical articles sufficiently accurate and up to date. Which is laudable, indeed. But it follows that articles like this are seen by some as an added maintenance burden, rather than as an alternative for which they are happy to let other editors slowly improve over time. --Mark viking (talk) 18:41, 17 September 2016 (UTC)
I remain supportive of combining them into navboxes. May be we could make a portion of the navboxes visible on mobile and when clicked would bring people to these type of pages? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 21:38, 18 September 2016 (UTC)

Articles of the Timeline of cholera are more history of X articles. Which I have no issue with. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 22:11, 18 September 2016 (UTC)

could be placed w/ navboxes--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 10:21, 27 September 2016 (UTC)
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