Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Pathology

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[edit] Wikiproject:pathology

Count me in, Nephron! Let me know if you have specific ideas on how I can help - I've spent a bit of time filling out Pathology already. It will be a challenge to sort through the nomenclature used in different countries and prevent articles from being redundant - perhaps we should come up with a master list on this page of which major articles we need, which should be redirects, and what content should be where. Looking forward to the project. --Rustavo 05:11, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

A list would be good. As for terminology, I think a combination of Google hits and PubMed hits is a good arbitrator (e.g. Talk:Ampulla of Vater, Talk:Fibular artery). There was some discussion about naming at WP:Anatomy in the past (as alluded to in Talk:Ampulla of Vater). For anatomical terms there is a general preference for descriptive terms over eponyms.
I'll like a to write a section about what pathologist do-- the importance of morphology and staining in diagnosis 'cause I think the speciality could be better explained and may be poorly understood.
Based on my experience (which admittedly is somewhat limited... but growing), the staining and histochemistry is mostly where it is at and this is very much related to the genetic basis of much disease (which is much of the hype these days with the work on the genome & proteome)-- as genetic abnormalities manifest as abnormal proteins and/or the abnormal location of proteins in the cell or on cells that usually don't have a given protein. Thinking about breast cancer as an example of this-- breast cancer is classified based on HER-2/Neu status, ER status and PR status-- those things are the pathologist's call (based on stains & an examination of the histomorphology). Nephron  T|C 05:51, 31 March 2007 (UTC)
Sounds good. One question is whether such details should go in pathology, anatomical pathology, or surgical pathology. Personally, I think that surgical pathology is the major componant of anatomical pathology, and the two pages should be remain combined. I think extensive details of the process of morphological diagnosis belong in anatomical pathology, rather than the Pathology page which covers a broader range of subtopics. Autopsy, cytopathology, molecular pathology etc., should have their own pages but be discussed briefly on the anatomical pathology page (speaking of which, the latter two pages could use some work!) We should also expand and crosslink to immunohistochemistry. Your take? -Rustavo 06:42, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

I'll try to help. I'm a histopathologist who likes his facts, grammar and spelling to be tidy. Hovea 03:27, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Nomenclature issues

Per Nephron's suggestion, I'm using Google and PubMed hit counts to help us decide some nomenclature issues for titling pages. I also find it useful to see what terms licensing bodies use. Here are the results with my suggestions (based on best 2/3 + later discussions):

Synonym-------------------| Google hits | Pubmed Hits | Governing body preferred? | Main page, or redirect?

Anatomic pathology------941,000----------2,062------------Yes(ABP-U.S.)-------------------Redirect

Anatomical pathology----244,000----------1,256-----------Yes(RCP-UK, others)-----------Main (priority per WP:ENGVAR)

---

Clinical pathology----------1,320,000--------8,108------------Yes(ABP-U.S.)-----------------Main

Laboratory medicine-----1,200,000--------25,498--------------------------------------------------Redirect

---

Chemical pathology------969,000----------3,324------------Yes(ABP-U.S.)-------------------Redirect

Clinical chemistry---------1,500,000--------34,736--------------------------------------------------Main

---

Experimental pathology--890,000----------4,845---------------------------------------------------Main

Investigative pathology---357,000----------20--------------------------------------------------------Redirect

I will post these on their respective talk pages and will try to get a consensus here and on the subject pages about suggested moves (e.g. Chem Path -> Clin Chem). -Rustavo

Many of these differences are UK vs US terminology. According to WP:NC, pages should not be moved around if it is just a difference between UK & US spelling.
I agree that "investigative pathology" should be a redirect. JFW | T@lk 23:52, 7 April 2007 (UTC)
This is exactly why I agreed with Nephron's suggestion to base the names on google and pubmed hit counts (which are not country-specific). Currently, the Clin Path vs. Lab Med ambiguity is the only one that could not be decided on that basis, since CP has a higher google count while LM wins PubMed. I'm using ABP terminology and inertia as the tiebreak on that one, but if you have a good reason why it should be the other way around, please explain. -Rustavo 00:38, 8 April 2007 (UTC)
Note that this is not exactly the same as an American vs. British spelling issue, since most of these terms have different histories and are in use in different contexts in both countries. -Rustavo 00:41, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

I have moved Chemical pathology to Clinical chemistry. There seems to be some debate over the merits of Anatomic pathology versus Anatomical pathology - please join the discussion on the latter page. -Rustavo 05:20, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

After discussion with Nephron and Jfdwolff, on Talk:Anatomical pathology we've reached consensus that the usage of "Anatomical pathology" vs. "Anatomic pathology" is nation-specifc and thus by WP:ENGVAR, the usage of the first major contributor (e.g. "Anatomical pathology") should be preferred. -Rustavo 23:48, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

I am updating the above chart as discussions progress and changes are made - please refer to History of this page to see its previous form. Others are welcome to update it as well. -Rustavo 13:16, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Proposed "blue box" template

v • d • e
Health science > medicine > physician > pathology

I am proposing we create a template similar to Template:Medicine which will serve both as a navagation tool for readers and a way to organize important pages and focus on them for improvement. The draft version is posted above. Of course, additions and changes are welcome, but if you make any changes, please explain your rationale below. Oh, and yes, I know hemepath is listed twice - if someone has a better suggestion, it would be appreciated. -Rustavo 05:32, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

OK, Template:Pathology is going online as of now. -RustavoTalk/Contribs 00:49, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

Here's the current version of the template:

v • d • e
Pathology
Principles of pathology
Anatomical pathology
Clinical pathology

A bit cleaner and more focused. -RustavoTalk/Contribs 13:20, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Requesting input on stub proposal: Pathology-stub

(Also posted at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Medicine and Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Clinical medicine}

Hi all. I've proposed a new stub, {{Pathology-stub}}, to mark the many proto-articles on topics related to Pathology - including various tools and techniques of pathologists, subspecialties of pathology, and microscopic entities which are part of disease processes and are used by pathologists in diagnosis. In assembling the items that would be appropriate for the stub, I found that some of them had been labeled as medical signs and marked with {{Med-sign-stub}}, under the broad definition that anything which is detectable and relates to a disease is a "medical sign". In my experience, named eponymous signs, and other medical entities specifically referred to as "signs" are concepts which refer primarily to a appearance or observation rather than to a physical entity which is part of the disease process itself. Thus, observations made on physical examination (e.g. strawberry tongue) or radiographic study (e.g. Kerley B lines) are "medical signs" but entities such as fibrosis, astrogliosis, and auer rods are not, and would be appropriate for my new stub & category. Whether you support or oppose my idea, I'd apprciate your joining the conversation at WikiProject Stub sorting/Proposals. Thanks. -RustavoTalk/Contribs 02:41, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

I didn't find the discussion at WikiProject Stub sorting/Proposals. It helps if you link directly to the section. You can do that with "#section_name", e.g. Forensic_pathology#Becoming_a_forensic_pathologist. Any case, I think it is a good idea... and based on the fact that you added it in the templates section I suppose it is already approved. :) Nephron  T|C 10:34, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
Yeah, it was approved a few weeks ago. Thanks for the tip! -RustavoTalk/Contribs 13:19, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Do we need a separate page for Surgical pathology?

Currently, surgical pathology is a redirect to anatomical pathology. I think it might be helpful to make these two separate pages, with anatomical pathology containing summaries and links to the various subdisciplines of anatomical pathology (e.g. Surgical pathology, cytopathology, autopsy, molecular pathology etc), as well as general info about the training, certification, and practice models of anatomical pathologists. I think we could write a really solid page on Surg Path alone, which would focus more on the actual role of surg path in the diagnosis and treatment planning of major disorders broken down by anatomical region, as well as an explanation of surg path workflow & techniques. Eventually, we could have the goal of making Pathology, Anatomical pathology and Surgical pathology very distinct pages in terms of subject matter, and each at good or featured article quality. This would be a pretty big change so, I wanted to put it up for comments. -RustavoTalk/Contribs 17:48, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

I posted a message on the anatomical pathology talk page. You can be more bold --see (WP:BOLD). Nephron  T|C 21:36, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
I am bold :-) Just thought I might get some input as I worked on the new surgical pathology page, and corresponding revisions of anatomical pathology and pathology. Check 'em out! -RustavoTalk/Contribs 20:36, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Cytology

We should probably create a cytology article at some point. Currently cytology redirects to cell biology, which is pretty exclusively focused on the biology/pure sciences side of things. There is nothing about the value of looking at individual cells for diagnostic purposes, i.e. pap test, peritoneal washings, bronchoalveolar washings et cetera. Nephron  T|C 05:02, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

I re-disambig'ed the article. Nephron  T|C 06:38, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
Do you mean Cytopathology? Emmanuelm (talk) 17:33, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
I do. The cytology article now makes this clear-- as per the definition in Stedman's.[1] Nephron  T|C 19:56, 20 April 2008 (UTC)


[edit] Let's get rid of NHL

Quick opinion survey. How many here would support the downgrading/demotion of the "non-Hodgkin lymphoma" concept and nomenclature, limiting it to paragraphs discussing the Working Formulation? This implies shortening the long, obsolete but surprisingly active Non-Hodgkin lymphoma article, redirecting the readers to Lymphoma. Your opinion? (please be clear)

  • I agree to downgrade the NHL concept, limiting it to historical discussions. Emmanuelm (talk) 17:30, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Weak disagreement. Average readers use NHL. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:44, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Disagree. I entirely sympathise with Emmanuelm's point, but WhatamIdoing is correct: virtually everyone uses NHL as a term, and it will be confusing to get rid of this. Using the same logic, one would get rid of "Cancer" as a single page. Better to keep the collective NHL page and educate from within.Jellytussle (talk) 21:19, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] comments

Please read my straw-poll vote as very weak disagreement, based entirely on the notion that Wikipedia reflects the world instead of leading it. Actually, Emmanuelm, the world's bad habit of talking about "NHL" as if it were a single disease is one of my pet peeves. You are entirely in the right of it. However, I think we need to reform the world before we change Wikipedia.

Having said that, if you want to (for example) substitute more precise language here and there, and if it "just happens" that the term NHL gets removed in the process, then I will support that effort. For example, I see no reason why ==Diagnosis, etiology, staging, prognosis, and treatment== couldn't point to more than two pages. I also see no reason why any information that is in the NHL page but is specific to (for example) T cell lymphomas couldn't be moved to the relevant article, even if that process happens to shorten the NHL article. (I favor moving the information to specific types of lymphomas instead of trying to unify it here: surely if you have Diffuse large B cell lymphoma, then you don't much care about the prognosis for "lymphomas in general" any more than you care about "lymphomas in general, except for Hodgkins".)

If, several years from now, NHL ends up as a redirect to Lymphoma, then you will get no complaint from me. However, if we do this now, and especially if we do this all at once, then (given the state of the world's stubborn and underinformed use of NHL) I think we'll have a whole lot of people unhappy with us. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:44, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

WIAD, you are right but you are also forgetting the primary function of an encyclopedia, including WP, which is to educate. Emmanuelm (talk) 12:57, 18 April 2008 (UTC)
JellyTussle, currently the article states under "Causes": Age/sex. The likelihood of getting non-Hodgkin's lymphoma increases with age. Burkitt's lymphoma is NHL; need I say more? As it stands, the article is misleading and it is our responsibility to correct this. Emmanuelm (talk) 14:09, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
I think that NHL needs to discuss only the fact that lymphomas were previously divided between Hodgkin's and NHL on the basis of histological features (Reed-Sternberg cells). Now that immunohistochemistry allows us to subtype cells to a great level of detail, the old classification is not only unnecessary but also mixes high- and low-grade diseases with utterly different epidemiologies, risk factors and prognoses. JFW | T@lk 21:31, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

Technical note: this discussion is transcluded in Talk:lymphoma, Talk:Non-Hodgkin lymphoma, Talk:Cancer, Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Pathology. Comments posted here will be shown in all.