Wikipedia talk:Identifying reliable sources (medicine)

Finding journals that comply with WP:MEDRS standards

I did a bunch of searching on the National Library of Medicine site to discern the best ways to determine if a journal meets WP:MEDRS standards, e.g., "Is it indexed by MEDLINE?" and "Is it listed in the Index Medicus?" Based on what I found, I created a list of guides, FAQS, tutorials, etc. at User:Markworthen/PubMed-Help, including specific help for Finding journals that comply with WP:MEDRS standards. If I have repeated help that's already available somewhere else on Wikipedia, please let me know! Otherwise, I'm posting this info in case it's helpful to other editors.   - Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) (I'm a man—traditional male pronouns are fine.) 06:27, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

I'm finding https://www.scopus.com/sources to be quicker. The comparison with other journals in the same field(s) is particularly handy. Other research suggests that the lowest ~20% of journals have more problems (e.g., blatant copyvios), and no editor with any sense will argue that only the top handful of journals in any field are acceptable (unless we're grasping at straws to support some serious POV pushing, but No True™ Wikipedia Editor would ever stoop to that, right? ;-) ), so it's convenient to be able to look up a journal, see that it's in the middle quintile, and stop wondering whether the bad one is the one called J Vague Abbr or the one called Int J Vague Abbr. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:45, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Great tip WhatamIdoing! Thank you.   - Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) (I'm a man—traditional male pronouns are fine.) 16:22, 21 June 2020 (UTC)

One of my concerns about WP:MEDRS is that some subjects are covered in good journals that are not indexed in MEDLINE because they are not biomedical journals. My experience is primarily with psychology topics. I searched the Scopus subject index (at the link WhatamIdoing posted) and found Medicine > Psychiatry and Mental Health, and I was pleased to see that it lists several clinical psychology journals. In fact the top two are clinical psych journals (Annual Review of Clinical Psychology and Clinical Psychology Review). Nice. :)   - Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) (I'm a man—traditional male pronouns are fine.) 16:38, 21 June 2020 (UTC)

Probably a good idea to mention WP:CITEWATCH and WP:UPSD to detect sources which aren't reliable too. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 16:27, 21 June 2020 (UTC)

Henceforth, I will check both WP:CITEWATCH and Scopus for psychiatry & psychology journals. WP:CITEWATCH (and Headbomb's very helpful script, the Unreliable/Predatory Source Detector (UPSD)), provides excellent general (and moderately specific) information about journals. For example, WP:CITEWATCH and UPSD provide cautionary information about journals published by Frontiers Media. Regarding a specific journal, Frontiers in Psychiatry, our Wikipedia article offers cautionary information, and, at the same time, the journal ranks in the top 20% of Psychiatry and Mental Health journals per Scopus. My take is that Frontiers in Psychiatry contains many well-written, well-referenced, good articles, but it also contains some mediocre articles that do not pass muster.   - Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) (I'm a man—traditional male pronouns are fine.) 16:58, 21 June 2020 (UTC)

UPSD's one-size-fits-none treatment of Frontiers is one of the reasons that I wouldn't recommend it to anyone. The directions say to use it merely as a simple guide and to double-check it, but basically nobody does. Some of them are rather dogmatic about its results: We joke that we'd take a self-published blog post from Albert Einstein on physics, but if he published an article in one of the journals highlighted by USPD, some editors don't care whether he's an expert. If that script evaluated every journal separately, or if it removed the publishers who are in the 50–50 range (including Frontiers), then it would be less susceptible to misuse, but I don't see any way around the problem of editors trusting the script (and therefore distrusting the publisher) more than independent evaluations or the judgment of experienced editors. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:07, 21 June 2020 (UTC)

I find the script to be helpful, but then I also investigate further. I agree that many editors do not appreciate the importance of a detailed, nuanced evaluation of individual articles and journals. I will continue to challenge rigid, simplistic conclusions about references, but my impression is that there are more "rigid editors" who spend more time and energy on Wikipedia than "careful editors". Maybe something about this problem could be added to WP:MEDRS?   - Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) (I'm a man—traditional male pronouns are fine.) 17:23, 21 June 2020 (UTC)

Frontiers is a garbage publisher, which happens to publish acceptable research occasionally/semi-frequently. It varies greatly by journal and it varies even more from paper to paper, but their journals will accept nearly everything and editorial boards get sacked when they emphasize quality over quantity. As a researcher, I wouldn't cite a Frontiers paper unless absolutely necessary, or that I vetted every line of the paper myself. On Wikipedia, I wouldn't cite them unless it was for completely routine information, or absolutely necessary. Certainly wouldn't cite them for the conclusions found in the papers unless, again, it was absolutely necessary. Some might pass MEDRS, but I would be extremely uneasy to cite anything MEDRS to a Frontiers paper. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 21:00, 21 June 2020 (UTC)

And since Zefr (talk · contribs) thanked me for the above, I'll take the opportunity to distance myself from their one-size-fits-all approach to Frontiers and their continuous misapplication of "per WP:CITEWATCH" as an argument to remove sources. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 21:10, 21 June 2020 (UTC)

A topical example of the pitfalls of a one-size-fits-all approach to Frontiers might be PMID 32984206, which publishes a statement by the pediatric section/s of the European Society for Emergency Medicine and European Academy of Pediatrics (a relevant potential MEDRS). More subjectively perhaps, I would feel uncomfortable not being able to cite PMID 30619331 – an uncommonly useful review by subject experts that sets out to cover a key topic. 86.161.190.118 (talk) 09:47, 30 September 2020 (UTC)

At the same time, I also feel a personal need to caution against excessive reliance on impact factors, given the ethically troubling practices of certain 'non-predatory' journals to game the system, with editorial boards that more or less subtlety exert direct or indirect pressure on authors to selectively cite their journal. I've seen egregious deployment of such practices, including targeted creation by professionally affiliated or 'friendly' authors of largely redundant reviews specifically designed to self-cite the journal, and how they can propel a journal into the leading bunch within a highly competitive sector. I wouldn't go as far as to suggest that the content of that particular journal is necessarily unreliable, but I can easily empathize with some of the strongly felt opinions expressed above about co-ercing quantity over quality. Imo, a significant concern here is to avoid rejecting pertinent medrs content (maybe regarding rare diseases, or non-Western populations) that is otherwise acceptable, just based on a lowish impact factor which may actually reflect a greater degree of editorial integrity than the numerical score might suggest. Here again, I think we need to be wary of one-size-fits-all approaches. 86.190.128.121 (talk) 10:23, 1 October 2020 (UTC)

• Hear, hear! Exceptionally well said. Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) [he/his/him] 03:35, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

Suggestion ref. primary sources

Apologies but it seems the medical rules for wiki are different from the rest of wiki; if consensus sources only are acceptable, then the content becomes much more backward-looking than the rest of wiki (where a comment sourced by a primary sources is acceptable). I wonder if each medical article could have a link to a 'primary research' addendum article - or an appendix discussing primary sources. Then readers would be ale to see some of the more recent research directions and thinking. It just seems odd that there is this difference in medical articles on wiki c.f. other articles.JCJC777 (talk) 06:04, 3 August 2020 (UTC)

Actually the whole of Wikipedia, not just WP:MED prefers secondary sources (see WP:SECONDARY). Secondary sources are especially important in biomedical sciences because of the Replication crisis. In short, an astonishing high percentage of scientific experiments simply cannot be repeated. It is therefore essential that these results are reviewed and integrated with other studies before concluding the results are reliable. Furthermore how many times have you heard that coffee causes disease X and then a new study published in the next month claims that coffee cures disease X. Independent studies often come to different conclusions. Which study should be cited? Again, the only way to arrive at a reliable conclusion is to rely on secondary sources. Boghog (talk) 12:31, 1 October 2020 (UTC)

Wikipedia simply is not the place to report primary research results. That's what journals are for. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 14:07, 1 October 2020 (UTC)

@JCJC777: I have had similar concerns in the past, but over time I have come to appreciate the policy on reliable sources generally and primary sources specifically, although it has been a bumpy journey. Discussions like this one have definitely helped me gain a deeper understanding, but probably the most helpful thing I've done is to read this content guideline—Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources (medicine)—over and over again. It is a carefully written guideline that I would rate A-class + good article + featured article, if we had such quality indicators for Wikipedia guidelines. In other words, it's a top-notch, best-in-its-class guideline. (IMHO, of course.) ¶ Note that the "primary source rule" is not a rigid, "never ever" rule. The guideline itself notes exceptions. The leading coronavirus and COVID-19 articles on Wikipedia serve as exemplars for understanding this guideline, including judicious, careful, conservative citations to a select few primary sources. Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) [he/his/him] 03:51, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

P.S. Despite this excellent guideline, many primary sources sneak into medical articles, often in the Risks/Genetics and Pathophysiology sections (among others), I think partly because such research is inherently fascinating and we want to tell people about it! But we really shouldn't until several replications support the original research and good meta-analytic and systematic review articles have been published in reliable sources (journals). I frequently find primary source articles cited as evidence for conclusory statements in an article. For example, in Post-traumatic stress disorder#Genetics, "There is evidence that those with a smaller hippocampus are more likely to develop PTSD following a traumatic event" based on a primary source (very preliminary study) - see my edit (diff) and "Heightened startle responses and a smaller hippocampal volume have been identified as biomarkers for the risk of developing PTSD", again based on a primary source reporting on a very small sample, very preliminary study (diff). Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) [he/his/him] 04:24, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

many thanks. much appreciated. will read the guide. JCJC777 (talk) 06:57, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

VPI regarding non-review sources

Watchers of this page may be interested in Wikipedia:Village pump (idea lab) § Biomedical Sciences: An idea to identify acceptable primary research for citations (in addition to citing reviews). Izno (talk) 13:26, 5 October 2020 (UTC)

I would encourage you to read this too. It seems a good way to assess the importance of primary research publications which need recognition and inclusion, alongside or before any secondary reviews. Jrfw51 (talk) 17:44, 5 October 2020 (UTC)

Proposed copy edit for Definitions section

I suggest modifying these two sentences in the definitions section:

Text that relies on primary sources should usually have minimal weight, only be used to describe conclusions made by the source, and must describe these findings clearly so that all editors even those without specialist knowledge can check sources. Primary sources should never be cited in support of a conclusion that is not clearly made by the authors (see WP:Synthesis).

Here is my suggested copy edit:

Text that relies on primary sources should be given due weight; that is, statements, paragraphs, and sections supported by reliable secondary or tertiary sources should contain greater depth of detail, more text, and superior prominence of placement compared to primary-source-supported statements. Text that relies on primary sources should clearly indicate that any conclusions made by the source are just that since the conclusions may or may not receive support in subsequent research by others. Primary-source-supported statements must describe research findings clearly so that all editors even those without specialist knowledge can check sources. Primary sources should never be cited in support of conclusory statements in "wikivoice". Conclusory statements must be supported by good secondary or tertiary sources such as meta-analytic or systematic reviews and clinical guidelines.

I am sure my suggested copy edit will benefit from additional refinements by other editors. But what do you think about the gist of my changes as reflected in the above? Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) [he/his/him] 20:00, 5 October 2020 (UTC)

Have you brought this up because of this discussion? I oppose the change. We can use a primary source to make a conclusive statement in Wikipedia's voice (which is why the section question currently states what it states), but context matters. If the topic is barely researched, mainly only has primary sources, and the statement is obviously non-controversial, I see no problem with stating the matter in Wikipedia's voice. There is not always a need to state "A [so and so] study reported [so and so]." And per Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Medicine-related articles#Citing sources, it is best to avoid something like "An uncontrolled survey involving 132 experienced long-distance backpackers on the Appalachian trail in 1997 concluded that washing hands after defecating reduces the incidence of diarrhea in the wilderness." unless necessary. I'm of the opinion that attributing a mater to the source via text is necessary when it's a controversial statement or a statement that very likely conflicts with other research on the topic. But when that's not the case or when that's not the case and what is being reported on the matter is all that is known about the topic regarding that aspect? I don't see the problem. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 03:37, 6 October 2020 (UTC)

We (WikiProject Medicine) sometimes exhibit astounding hypocrisy when it comes to WP:MEDRS. If another editor cites a primary source we don't like, we launch an aggressive "colon attack"—with WP:MEDRS the first missile we launch at the benighted offender. But when we think an area of inquiry merits discussion in an article, we know how to artfully include conclusory statements based on preliminary findings that cite primary sources. If anyone challenges our wise additions, we point with indignation and a practiced superciliousness to WP:MEDDEF. ¶ "How clever you are, my dear! You never mean a single word you say." Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) [he/his/him] 00:17, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

I certainly wouldn't say I've seen "astounding hypocrisy". Even your proposed version still allows for primary sources, yet we will still have editors removing primary sources in many cases because of concerns about weight. On the flip side, if there are cases where undue weight is being put on what primary sources say, or WP:In-text attribution is needed, that can be addressed under current guidelines. Crossroads ^-talk- 03:26, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

We never perceive ourselves as being hypocritical. We perceive ourselves as "defending the wiki" (that's when I remove your content) and "improving articles" (that's when I cite the kind of source that I won't let you cite).

However, I don't think that we win any prizes here. I think the prize goes to the people who have trouble remembering that Wikipedia:Secondary does not mean independent, and who will insist that their article, cited exclusively to breaking news, is 100% sourced to "secondary" sources, because the reporter isn't an active participant in the story. At least when we cite original experimental results in medical articles, we're citing something a a little stronger than a TV news reporter standing in front of a burning house and saying that a house is on fire ("It's news because we can stick a camera in front of it"). WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:41, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, I don't see that we should make it that specific and detailed. I think the more concise existing version works. It's also important to emphasize that synthesis is improper. Crossroads ^-talk- 19:08, 6 October 2020 (UTC)

Markworthen, this reminds me of WP:Based upon. All articles should be "based upon" secondary sources, but no article is absolutely required to eschew all primary sources. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:05, 6 October 2020 (UTC)

Interesting essay - thanks for alerting me to it. And I agree with what you wrote. :) Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) [he/his/him] 00:18, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

I got tired of repeating myself (mostly at WT:V), so I eventually wrote it down in one place. See also WP:LIKELY and WP:Published for similar pages. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:36, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

Perhaps it would be useful to give an example, either an existing well-written one or one you propose might require primary sources and use them wisely. After all, the guideline should demonstrate best-practice. Also beware that although we casually describe a research paper as a primary source, it may contain weak secondary source material (background section) and not everything we may use it for is from the conclusions. For example, some things may just be bare facts about the study itself like where the research was conducted, how large it was, that some patients died, or identifying a researcher involved. Oh, and to clarify, those things are unlikely to appear in the treatment section of a disease or indications sections of a drug, but could perhaps appear in a history section or in text about the research institution or researcher. Most likely WP:WEIGHT would require secondary sources to be writing about those things, though as noted above, weight can be difficult to judge if very few people are writing about a worthy article topic at all. -- Colin°^Talk 07:31, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

@Crossroads - You're right. "Astounding" was a tad hyperbolic. Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) [he/his/him] 18:25, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

@Colin - Great suggestion. Everything else you wrote makes good sense to me. Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) [he/his/him] 18:25, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

@WhatamIdoing - Is there anything other than "breaking news" these days? :^O ... PBS Newshour rocks! ;-) Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) [he/his/him] 18:28, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

I've been surprised at how much longform reporting is available. Once the writers aren't constrained to a certain number off column–inches, and the reader isn't constrained to the local newspaper, things like longreads.com became viable. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:58, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

If you need help finding examples, then you might try User:MastCell's early editing. It would only be fitting, since the section on preferring secondary sources was largely his idea. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:00, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

References

Change guidance about indexing in bibliographic databases to be open to non-MEDLINE indexed journals?

Any thoughts on this edit (which I reverted) by new account Meansell?

I ask because although I don't cite "non-MEDLINE" as a reason to reject journals, I know that a number of editors have and still do today. And that includes Tgeorgescu, who likely wants to comment on Meansell's edit.

What non-MEDLINE indexed journal should we be open to?

Meansell, hi. Welcome. Although your account is new, you don't appear to be new to editing Wikipedia. By this, I mean that it's very unusual for the very first edits by a brand new account to be to their user page (unless it's a student editor) and/or to a policy or guideline page. You did both. So I wondered what brought you here. I do see that you state on your user page that you edit Wikipedia infrequently, which I take to mean "as an IP." Did the Wikipedia + Libraries asynchronous Moodle course offered by the Network of the National Library of Medicine, which you mention on your user page, bring you here? If so, how did that come about? Why did you make the MEDLINE edit? Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 23:58, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

Hi Flyer22 Frozen,

Yes, I'm a 'student' editor insofar as I'm taking a continuing education course through the NNLM, and have made some edits on random pages in the past that I could've sworn I made while logged in, but apparently wasn't based on my contributions history. I edited the policy/guideline page because as a medical librarian I'm pretty familiar with predatory publishing and what counts as a reputable source, and can claim with some authority that excluding sources based on simply whether they are indexed in MEDLINE or not is rather problematic, as it excludes quite a bit of quality health science literature that is indexed in other reputable databases such as CINAHL (which focuses on nursing) and Embase (which originally specialized in pharma/drug lit). While I definitely agree that MEDLINE is top tier and a core biomedical literature database, it can't be the only indicator upon which sources are included/excluded. Meansell (talk) 03:09, 8 October 2020 (UTC)

But there is already the exception Determining the reliability of any individual journal article may also take into account whether the article has garnered significant positive citations in sources of undisputed reliability, suggesting wider acceptance in the medical literature despite any red flags suggested here. So, I guess, that trumps lack of MEDLINE indexation.

Yeah, if it is an important discovery, it doesn't matter where it was published. The tricky part is however: convince us that it is an important discovery. (No, it is not impossible to do it, it is just hard.) Tgeorgescu (talk) 17:40, 8 October 2020 (UTC)

Meansell, you stated that you thought you were signed in. Although I wondered if you had only just created the Meansell account on October 5th and therefore wondered what account you would have signed into before this one, I see that you created your account at 21:17 on June 5, 2017 (3 years ago).

As for the edit in question, we need a standard. As you know, we obviously just can't allow any journal to be used. "MEDLINE-indexed" gives us a standard. Maybe we should have a few examples listed. I will alert WP:Med to this discussion for further input. Please don't ping me if you reply. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 00:58, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

I understand there is an exception, but, as Tgeorgescu mentions, this places an additional ("not impossible, but hard") burden of proof on articles from non-MEDLINE journals to demonstrate themselves worthy of an exception, one which is unnecessary if the journal is indexed in a reputable non-MEDLINE database, of which there are several. I agree that having several examples of reputable databases that meet MEDLINE-level standards is a good idea - I'm happy to contribute suggestions of core biomedical databases of high quality. Meansell (talk) 05:22, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

MEDLINE indexes Medical Hypotheses, which should give any editor a good reason not to take MEDLINE as the sole arbiter.

MEDLINE also rejects most non-English journals – which means that middling English-language journals are being preferred over some high-quality French, German, etc., journals – and journals that are on the edges of medicine but which still have relevant biomedical information (e.g., chemistry). The language problem is not a small one, especially in psychiatry and psychology, as different languages/cultures have different approaches to some conditions. To give just two examples, I expect that most of you are aware of the differences between American and French pediatric psychiatrists when it comes to ADHD, and Haltlose personality disorder, which was mentioned at WT:MED the other day, is almost never diagnosed outside of Europe. It's not because these things don't exist around the world, but because the conventional medical establishment has different ideas.

I think that, in general, we need to reconsider how we're teaching editors to evaluate journals. There are no magic numbers and no magic lists. You really need to look at multiple indicators. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:10, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

Being in MEDLINE/PubMed is a basic minimum, in the sense that not being in MEDLINE is a huge redflag. Being in MEDLINE doesn't mean it's good enough though, it has plenty of predatory and low-quality journals in it, just that it at least has a chance of being good enough. If you want to skew the odds in your favour, go with coverage in Index Medicus. Again, not a garantee of anything (e.g. it includes the Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine for example), but there's a much higher treshold of quality for inclusion. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 11:44, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

Side note, Q8 in the CiteWatch FAQ will have some relevant advice which could potentially be adapted for here. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 11:51, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

@Headbomb: Overall, I absoulutely get where you're coming from here. My question/s would be: Do you think the non-MEDLINE red flag is also valid for fields such as psychiatry or clinical psychology (cf WAID's point above), where PsycINFO, for example, is a key resource? Also *perhaps*: In cases of geographically circumscribed content (and/or some rare conditions maybe), could there be a case to waive this sort of general restriction if broadly MEDRS-compliant content appears in a smaller (maybe local/regional), non-predatory journal that isn't actually MEDLINE-indexed? (And on a sidenote, I think the potential for contribution by medical librarians here is good :). 86.186.94.204 (talk) 15:45, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

I'm no doctor or librarian, and have no real qualified opinion about the state of psychology representation in medline. However, local/regional considerations are a no-go for me. An unknown journal from the small country of Foobar does not get to dodge WP:MEDRS because of "but it's a small Foobari journal, coverage in MEDLINE enforces Western Bias!!!" types of arguments, because those types of arguments ignore that the scientific standards in the small country of Foobar often leave much to be desired. India has the Ministry of AYUSH for example, and a plethora of garbage publishers like the OMICS Publishing Group. It's not all Indian medical journals that are crap, of course, but going 'but it's an Indian journal, we shouldn't expect it to be in MEDLINE!' is a great way to add all sorts of nonsense. The Journal of the Indian Medical Association is in the Index Medicus for example. There's no reason the other Indian journals should have to play by different rules. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 15:59, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

I'm agreed with Headbomb. Additionally, English is the lingua franca of academia, so if something does not appear at all in English journals, that is a red flag. That another culture has another approach to things is not an argument for including that as valid; we are not to be cultural relativists. WAID uses the example of the differences between American and French pediatric psychiatrists when it comes to ADHD, but this is just the sort of thing we should be very skeptical of, because France is unusual in being still enamored with Freudian psychoanalysis, which has been discredited elsewhere. [1] As for because the conventional medical establishment has different ideas, well, that's just the point. Wikipedia is a WP:MAINSTREAM encyclopedia and is to say what the conventional medical and scientific establishments say. This is not the site to make the case for non-mainstream ideas. Crossroads ^-talk- 16:26, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

agree w/ HEADBOMB and Crossroads--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 19:21, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

(hum... just to point out that my second query was a tentative one, and I had absolutely no intention of entering into "...MEDLINE enforces Western BIAS!!!" polemic. I have no direct experince of PsycINFO, but am aware of its potential relevance (including in systematic retrieval of guidance/instruments), though not necessarily regarding MEDRS - ping @User:Markworthen for a (possible :) informed opinion .) 86.186.94.204 (talk) 17:05, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

Headbomb and Crossroads, I agree with you in general, but I think you've accidentally overstated the case. When a local/regional journal reports specifically local information (e.g., number of measles cases in Foobari last year, whether you can get the drugs your patients need), then we should not treat them the same as you treat the "SCAM" industry. ("SCAM" is a pointedly disparaging abbreviation for "Supplements, Complementary, and Alternative Medicine".) There might very well be a "Western bias" that makes larger journals yawn and drop such papers in the trash, when they would accept the same type and quality of paper if the country reported on figured more prominently among its subscribers. Not all biomedical information is about efficacy.

(Crossroads, AFAICT Freud has nothing to do with the French approach to ADHD. The fact that it's illegal to give methylphenidate and similar drugs to young children is probably relevant, though.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:48, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

Meansell's two edits (diff) are spot on. I hope they will be restored, but I won't hold my breath. // MEDLINE indexes biomedical literature. If an article on a biomedical topic cites a journal that MEDLINE doesn't index, that journal begins with a deficit (in terms of credibility & reliability. Of course, such journals will occasionally publish really good articles, but the burden of proof is on the citing Wikipedian. // On the other hand, MEDLINE does not index scores of top-notch psychology journals, and probably hundreds of high-quality social science journals generally. That's not a criticism of MEDLINE by the way. MEDLINE's indexing policy is clear, as is its purpose. // Unfortunately, my experience over the years is that arguments to bring more nuance and clarity to WP:MEDRS usually get shot down. Bang, bang, you chased me out of town—again. Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) [he/his/him] 17:47, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

Nuance is perceived as the opposite of clarity. Some editors want bright-line rules that they can enforce against other people's contributions. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:50, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

Well said, WhatamIdoing. Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) [he/his/him] 17:53, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

• I was asked to comment: In all countries, there are journals that primarily treat national problems. This occurs in all the descriptive sciences, in engineering,, and in public heath. Medline is an Index originally prepared primarily for the US, but with the intent of having an international audience, and it includes all journals in its field dealing in a significant way with world wide problems, and also all journals in its field deal with problems local to the US. In deciding whether to include journals dealing with problems specific to other countries, it focuses on the traditional English speaking countries, and even hereit is less complete than for the US. It includes only the most important journals from elsewhere, regardless of the level of development. This applies as much to France as it does to Nepal. The countries that are most disadvantaged by this at the moment are Japan and China--there are hundreds of Chinese medical journals that would probably be included if they were published in the US in English. Scientists in China and Japan know this, and if they are aiming for an international audience they publishing in the important English language international journals--this is in fact a formal requirement for promotion in the Chinese academic system.

The example "number of measles cases in Foobari last year" is unfair. There are very significant medical problems that rarely occur in the US, but frequently do elsewhere. A great many public health problems are specific to a particular political system. There would be no reason for work in most of these, however important, to be published in a Medline journal. Fwiw, this problem is even more severe in some social science fields: for example, essentially everything on Norse archeology is published in non-English journals that are very rarely found in the US. I've had considerable difficulty getting academics working in such fields accepted into WP. DGG ( talk ) 07:28, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for this information, DGG. And, I repeat WAID's "Not all biomedical information is about efficacy." We seem to focus way too much on that, and the kind of sources that are only really focused on that. -- Colin°^Talk 09:07, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

DGG, are there other/reputable indexes that you would consider to be helpful in identifying decent journals for biomedical-related information? (I'm assuming your advice isn't to give up entirely on using any indexes at all.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:24, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

my advice is to consider the principal journals in each field in each country as notable. There are indexes for Japanese and 'Chinese journals, bt I am unable to use them. There is no index for Indian journals. The available international indexes are Excerpta Medica and the various parts of the Commonwealth Agricultural Bureau databases, but I have never had occasion to use them. DGG ( talk ) 02:14, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

Core clinical journals

A recent edit (diff) included this statement in the edit note: "(→‎Searching for sources: ...update wording to fit current PubMed interface - hum... "core clinical journals" option gone awol[?])". The "core clinical journals" are also known as the Abridged Index Medicus. However, "the Abridged Index Medicus (AIM) was the list of journals covered in the hardcopy publication 'Abridged Index Medicus', which ceased with the December 1997 issue. Until early 2020, the journal list was also used online as a search subset limit or filter called 'Core clinical journals' in PubMed®." So, the editor is correct, "core clinical journals" is not longer a subset limit when searching PubMed, although the list of journals is available at Abridged Index Medicus. Just FYI. Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) [he/his/him] 19:28, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for that Markworthen. Given that the edit was merely a further update to ==Searching for sources== I didn't think it was necessary to post here. But now I notice that that handy (for us) PubMed feature was also referenced earlier on the page, under ==Biomedical journals== (now also trimmed[2]). (Fwiw - and OT with respect to WP:MEDRS - personally, I'm missing other traditional features that seem to have gone missing in the current interface, including the ability to to see one's search query "translated" into the string actually used by the search engine - I want to look into this when I get a moment, because I find it hard to believe this is no longer possible). 86.190.128.65 (talk) 17:10, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

Advanced --> Details > and there it is! Jrfw51 (talk) 19:07, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

Also ping Mcbrarian (hoping she may have some useful input to share regarding the recent changes to the PubMed interface). 86.190.128.65 (talk) 17:22, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

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