Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Medicine-related articles

Classification

This content often fits best under diagnosis as it is often only during the diagnostic stage of things that one figures out the diagnosis anyway. Comments? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 06:41, 18 June 2011 (UTC)

RFC: restructuring of the Manual of Style

Editors may be interested in this RFC, along with the discussion of its implementation:

Should all subsidiary pages of the Manual of Style be made subpages of WP:MOS?

It's big; and it promises huge improvements. Great if everyone can be involved. Noetica^Tea? 00:43, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Adding medical guidelines

I added the following note on adding medical guidelines to articles - [1]. Further comments or ideas in this matter are appreciated. Mikael Häggström (talk) 06:20, 3 September 2011 (UTC)

Images

From this email message: I wonder if we could produce a useful section here that deals with how to take good images of people for medicine-related articles. I'm thinking far more about the "please put the person in the standard anatomical position" than the "figuring out what paperwork you're legally required to do is complicated" aspects. Any ideas or advice you'd give? Imagine the case of a person with an easily visible medical condition, and he wants to take a picture of himself to illustrate an article that currently has zero images. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:13, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

I've had a go at this; please feel free to boldly improve it. I'm sure there is plenty of room for improvement. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:11, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for making a start on this. I'm too tired tonight to work on it so I'm not feeling very bold. Some thoughts. Drop the first sentence. We should link to Commons: Patient images. I'd like to see that essay become a guideline some day. Also Commons: Photographs of identifiable people. On "Identifiable people", I'd drop the first clause (no value) and the final sentence about "people who are strongly associated with the condition". Images of famous people are likely to appear in History or Social aspects of a disease, if at all, but very unlikely to illustrate medical aspects of a disease, for which we rely on amateur material or doctors releasing patient images. The "Sexual images" section is rather long. The "POV pushing" section contains some weird examples. I'll take your word for it that these have arisen but I'm not sure they are generally useful. Does anyone add an image for its "shock value"? Certainly editors differ in the ability to be shocked, offended or just made uncomfortable. I'd like to be able to say something like "Where images have equal value in illustrating a medical topic, be reluctant to use those that may shock, offend or make the reader uncomfortable." However, I suspect some NOT:CENSORED zealots will regard such a basic editorial wisdom as infringing on their rights to shock, offend and make readers uncomfortable. Colin°^Talk 20:13, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

I've a couple comments. As someone who gags at some of the more grotesque images (i.e. massive infections, examples of debrided wounds from necrotizing fasciitis), advice on shock images is appreciated. Also, unlike say, images of Muhammad (a discussion I was involved in recently) where the aversion or shock is learned, finding gore aversive is an innate, fairly universal reaction. Colin, I've encountered every single example of POV-pushing WAID lists (I wrote an essay about one). It'd be nice if editors could simply select the best image based on the relevant section, but such is not the case. It might be worth including a link to the new image filtration software too. WLU (t) (c) Wikipedia's rules:^simple/_complex 20:33, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

I've started making your changes, but it's time for lunch, and I'm not going to process them all now. Here are my initial thoughts:

• commons:Commons:Photographs of identifiable people has been largely incorporated into WP:IUP#Privacy_rights (which links it), so it's probably redundant.
• Yes, all three of the specific examples at the POV pushing are real.
• For "shock value", I'm trying very hard not to canonize bloody aborted fetuses as an example of shock value pictures (because they can actually be appropriate and encyclopedic, despite very few such uses ever appearing in Wikipedia's history). But, yes: it happens, especially when activists are trying to "raise awareness". Images of nearly dead children with flies crawling on them "sell better" than images of more moderate cases of malnutrition. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:39, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

I wonder whether the relatively lengthy "Sexual images" could be split into two points, one mostly about sex and the other about how to take or select a good anatomy article. I just can't quite see how to make it happen. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:17, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Medical procedures

I notice there isn't a section covering medical procedures. Is it worth a separate section, or could it just be folded into drugs and medications? WLU (t) (c) Wikipedia's rules:^simple/_complex 14:33, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

A separate section, I think. Talk:Reduction (orthopedic surgery) includes a suggested system for orthopedic surgeries. Alternatively, bits of the "Medical tests" section might be appropriate. WhatamIdoing (talk)

Thus?

• Indications
• Contra-indications
• Technique
• Risks/Complications
• Recovery/Rehabilitation
• History
• Society and culture
• In special populations
• In other animals

I moved the prognosis section up a bit, made more sense there. WLU (t) (c) Wikipedia's rules:^simple/_complex 13:18, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

What do you think about merging some of the related items, e.g., "Description (including synonyms)" or "Indications (including contra-indications)"? WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:23, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Indications IMO should go first followed by contra indications / risk / complications. Synonyms and the general description will be in the lead. An indepth discussion of the procedure will be in the technique section.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 12:38, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

I've removed "controversies" (should go in history), description and synonyms, merged contraindications, risks and complications and put them just below indications. Looks good? WLU (t) (c) Wikipedia's rules:^simple/_complex 19:48, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

What about a section on "society and culture" as well? Some procedures such as circ have a significant cultural / societal aspect.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 04:53, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Added to the list, as well as "in special populations" (useful for things like joint replacements say) and "in animals" for the rare procedure that can be done by vets. Looks ready to paste in? It hybridizes a series of other sections in a way that seems sensible. It does need a lead-in paragraph; any surgeons at WP:MED we could ask? I believe MastCell is one, I'll drop him a line. WLU (t) (c) Wikipedia's rules:^simple/_complex 02:26, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

I'd probably leave out "prognosis"; generally, prognosis is tied to underlying medical conditions, not to a specific procedure (for instance, a bowel resection performed for mesenteric ischemia carries a very different prognosis than a resection performed for Crohn's disease). I'd also leave out "pre-operative workup"; this may vary substantially by locale and will be difficult to globalize. "Post-operative rehabilitation" and "Timecourse of recovery" could be folded into a single section (e.g. "Recovery"). Overall, though, I think it's a good idea. I just think less is probably more here. MastCell ^Talk 04:40, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

Changed to in other animals to be consistent.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 04:56, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

It may be an anomaly, but a large proportion of the literature re circumcision is concerned with prophylactic effects (such as reduction in HIV risk). How would such material fit into such a structure? Jakew (talk) 08:51, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

Also, can I suggest making "pre-operative work-up" a subsection of "technique"? And also, perhaps, merging the "Post-operative rehabilitation" and "Timecourse of recovery" sections (which could be simply labelled "recovery")? I think that would probably make the TOC look more approachable, from a layperson's point of view. Jakew (talk) 08:57, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘It's now "recovery/rehabilitation" and a similar change to contraindications/risks/complications. Pre-op workup for when there is a recognized procedure, can simply be folded into technique I would think. Jakew, I would personally put that sort of information into "indications".

Anyone have any suggestions for a lead-in paragraph? WLU (t) (c) Wikipedia's rules:^simple/_complex 11:59, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

I don't think it works all that well under "indications". Positive health effects can be reasons for performing the procedure, but that isn't necessarily the case. Could we instead rename "Contra-indications/Risks/Complications" as "Contra-indications/Health consequences"? Would that be workable? Jakew (talk) 14:14, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

I don't think that's a good idea. Most health consequences are unambiguously positive (the most common "health consequence" of bowel resection is "the patient doesn't die in horrible pain.") We may have to IAR with some of these less-common issues, but if we were going to add this, I'd add it as part of Recovery/Rehabilitation, perhaps as "Outcomes" or "Health effects".

I'm also not sure that contra-indications and risks/complications make a natural pair. Indications and contra-indications are the "should we do this at all?" question. Risks and complications are "since we already did this, what could go wrong?" question. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:18, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Okay, good point. Perhaps that's best left as an optional extra section. Jakew (talk) 19:46, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

I think in cases where surgery is optional but has health benefits, it can be dealt with via common sense. No need to be proscriptive when it might only impact a minority of pages.

Moved risks/complications to below technique, seems to make more sense there. WLU (t) (c) Wikipedia's rules:^simple/_complex 20:20, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

As there have been no further comments for a few days, I've added the current list. Please feel free to boldly improve it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:51, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style/Medicine-related_articles#Infoboxes contains expired links

The following links in Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style/Medicine-related_articles#Infoboxes lead to errors (specifically, Error 403: User Account Expired):

• this page
• this page

Pmillerrhodes ^Talk_Contrib 18:26, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Fixed in this edit. A new server may be found here. Boghog (talk) 19:17, 8 January 2012 (UTC)