[WikiEN-l] Health advice from the web

[Ben Kovitz]

On Jul 24, 2009, at 2:46 PM, WereSpielChequers wrote:

> Todays New Scientist (vol 203 no 2718 page 20/21) has an interesting  
> article
> on the veracity of online medical information; with several somewhat
> inconsistent  references to wikipedia.

Here's the article:
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20327185.500-should-you-trust-health-advice-from-the-web.html?full=true

"More disconcerting is the percentage of doctors who turn to Wikipedia  
for medical information: 50 per cent..."

"How does Wikipedia fare as a medical reference? Its collaborative,  
user-generated philosophy generally means that errors are caught and  
corrected quickly. Several studies, including one examining health  
information, another probing articles on surgery, and one focusing on  
drugs, found the online encyclopedia to be almost entirely free of  
factual errors."

"Better still, the articles improve significantly with time, according  
to a study Clauson published last December in the The Annals of  
Pharmacotherapy (vol 42, p 1814). 'Wikipedia's editing policy does  
work,' he says."

"some drug firms have been caught removing negative information on  
their drugs from Wikipedia pages."

"The site's other major flaw is its incompleteness. Wikipedia was able  
to answer only 40 per cent of the drug questions Clauson asked of it.  
By contrast, the traditionally edited Medscape Drug Reference answered  
82 per cent of questions. 'If there is missing safety information  
about a drug, that can be really detrimental,' Clauson points out."


Ben