Since its launch, Wikipedia has been a source of both information and frustration for medical students and health professionals. In fact, students and academics of all stripes have long wrestled with the scholarly worth of Wikipedia’s user-generated knowledge.
Though anyone can technically make changes to almost every page, Wikipedia’s editing process is not as free-form as you might think. In fact, teams of volunteer editors join together to edit and review content that is relevant to their areas of expertise and interest. Wikiproject Medicine is one of these groups that works to ensure the quality and accuracy of medicine-related articles on Wikipedia.
A recent article in the BMJ profiled Wikiproject Medicine and laid out some interesting opportunities and challenges for the team. Part of the article is a call to action for potential editors, as the ease of use and speed of access to Wikipedia continues to rise amongst busy clinicians and health professionals.
WikiProject Medicine promotes itself as an information source for healthcare providers and students. One qualitative study reported that 70% of junior doctors used Wikipedia for health information at least once a week. With time constraints continuing to be a major barrier for clinicians trying to access evidence based information, the simplicity and speed of the Wikipedia format is appealing… If we really want to see the dissemination of evidence based information and facilitate putting evidence into practice, perhaps we need to start writing articles for Wikipedia.
Hats off to the team for their work so far, and due to its ease of use (and high Google rankings!), we hope to see the continued improvement of Wikipedia becoming a priority among many health professionals in the future.
[via ScienceRoll]