Wikipedia:Good article reassessment/Herpes zoster/1

Herpes zoster[edit]

Article (Edit · History) · Article talk (Edit · History) · Watch article · Watch article reassessment page

Result: Delist. There is no sign that the issues raised will be fixed shortly. Geometry guy 19:07, 18 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Not well written. I think it is particularly important that an article on a medical topic should be well written to minimize misunderstandings. The article failed a Featured Article Review earlier today. Snowman (talk) 22:12, 27 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Delist. I agree with Snowmanradio, this article can't really be considered to be well-written. I'm not really qualified to judge its technical accuracy, but I was persuaded that the authors had a good understanding of their subject. With a really good copy edit ths article could be a GA I think, but as it stands, no. --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 03:35, 29 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Weak delist. The article is reasonably well-written, assuming that the audience is medical professionals. However, MoS guidelines for medical articles prescribe prose appropriate for a general audience. In its current form the article likely fails that standard due to medical jargon. For example, see the article's second sentence:

It results from the reactivation of latent varicella zoster virus (VZV) located in the dorsal root and cranial nerve ganglion, spreading from one or more ganglia to the nerves of the affected segment and its corresponding cutaneous dermatome

Certainly the lead should discuss the mechanism (er, cause of the disease) in a non-technical manner. Majoreditor (talk) 04:19, 29 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have made a small improvement. How does it read now? Snowman (talk) 18:58, 3 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Delist. Phrases such as nerve cell bodies (used twice in the lead, attempting non-technical language?) are nonsense. And avoiding appropriate wikilinks does not help. Also, some important aspects of the disease are omitted or inadequately explained. These include HZ and pregnancy, HZ in infants and children, disseminated HZ (this looks like chickenpox), the prodromal stage, and the difficulty and importance of diagnosing HZ before or in the absence of blisters. When the virus reactivates, its stages are: prodromal pain, then pain and rash, then (usually) pain and rash with blisters (herpes zoster), then recovery with or without pain. Use of antivirals is still not adequately explained. These drugs are commonly given intravenously. Does this usually involve hospitalization? Is a port indicated? Epidemiology and prevention also are not adequately explained. --Una Smith (talk) 15:43, 9 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The article currently does not quite meet any of the six good article criteria. --Una Smith (talk) 18:27, 9 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This is a result of Snowman's laudable attempt to clarify an incomprehensible lead. Can you explain why "nerve cell bodies" is nonsense? It seems to me to refer to the body of nerve cells, i.e., the part which is not the axons. (Is that the nucleus?) Is this wrong? If so, how would you phrase it more correctly without being incomprehensible to the general reader?

An earlier version referred to dorsal root ganglia and cranial nerve ganglia. I tried myself to provide a better explanation, but on following the wikilinks, I only learnt that "the dorsal root ganglion (or spinal ganglion) is a nodule on a dorsal root that contains cell bodies of neurons in afferent spinal nerves." and "a ganglion (pl. ganglia) is a tissue mass, composed mainly of somata and dendritic structures, that often interconnects with other ganglia to form a complex system of ganglia known as a plexus. Ganglia provide relay points and intermediary connections between different neurological structures in the body, such as the peripheral and central nervous systems." I kept searching for a definition which was not self-referential, but failed.

So I learnt nothing, and was unable to clarify the lead. Despite reading several Wikipedia articles, I still have very little idea what a ganglion is, and I am, er, kind of fairly well educated. Still, this article is better than Cranial nerve which surely wins the prize for wikification of obfuscation ("innervates the muscles of mastication"!)

A good general strategy, in my view, especially for the lead, is to use informal descriptions, but to provide wikilinks to precise descriptions. If I knew it was correct, I would have written never cell bodies, but apparently it is wrong, and in any case the precise links fail to clarify the meaning. Can you fix it Una Smith? Geometry guy 23:00, 9 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

A further complication, as far as I understand it, and it is in one of the quoted references, the viruses are "held" within autonomic ganglia, cranial nerve ganglia, and dorsal root ganglia. It might be better to transfer this discussion to the talk page, where more people might participate and help to fix the page. Snowman (talk) 23:14, 9 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If I may say, I do not believe that it is the primary purpose of GAR to act as a sick bed to recuperate poorly articles. If an article can be fixed quickly then great, let's do it. But this one has been here for over two weeks now. The concensus appears to be that in its present form it should not be listed as a GA. If/when the issues that have been raised are addressed, then it can very easily be renominated. For now I would suggest that it ought to be delisted and those that are interested in improving the article can do so offline of this GAR process. --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 23:30, 9 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I agree, but I don't think we need to panic about a GAR nomination which is only 2 weeks old. Thanks to a lot of recent archiving, GAR is well able to cope. If this GAR were a month old, I would be pressing for archiving, but it isn't yet, and we have had an interesting new contribution from Una Smith opposing changes made by a reviewer to improve the article towards GA status. I think it may be worthwhile to keep this GAR open to establish some agreement as to which direction the article needs to move in order to become GA in the future. The consensus to delist is not yet clear according to the archiving guidelines. I expect that a delist is likely, but lets give the review process a chance to deliver something before we make that decision. Geometry guy 00:24, 10 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

PS. Feel free to copy any comments here to the talk page, if that would help. It is all GDFL licensed, after all!

One GA (and FA) criterion is that the article be stable. This article is very, very far from stable. By the way, for an informal description of scientific detail to work, the writer not only must know the science inside and out, but also must know the common misconceptions that non-scientists have about the science. To write about any complex subject, usually I find it necessary to do some library research. There are many books about herpes zoster, some of them consisting entirely of high-quality reviews. Last night I read one book: Herpes Zoster, Monographs in Virology, vol 26, editors Gross and Doerr, Karger, 2006. I learned a lot. --Una Smith (talk) 04:37, 10 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see any evidence of instability at ALL in the revision history. I see several editors collaborating to fix the problems noted above, but activity is not equivalent to instability. The article is improving, and I see no evidence of an editwar at all... --Jayron32|talk|contribs 04:41, 10 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Una, I disagree with your philosophy: there is not one writer of an article at WP, but many. One editor (at least) needs to know the science inside-out, another needs to know the common misconceptions; a third needs to know how to write well for a general audience. If these editors work together, they can create a great article. Now, can you answer my questions above, e.g., why is "nerve cell bodies" wrong? Thanks. Geometry guy 21:47, 12 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think we can agree that if someone wants to write about the cell biology of HZ, they should at least read an introductory textbook about cell biology. Re the particulars, please see Talk:Herpes zoster. --Una Smith (talk) 17:51, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Many thanks for the helpful talk page comment. Re this comment, I hope instead we can agree that in an article like HZ, it is vital to have editors working on it who have at least read an introductory textbook about cell biology; however it is also invaluable to have contributions from editors who haven't. Geometry guy 00:19, 15 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]